


Take a breath (you'll need it where you're going)

by brynnmck



Category: American Idol RPF, David Cook (Musician)
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-09
Updated: 2011-12-09
Packaged: 2017-10-27 03:22:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/291089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brynnmck/pseuds/brynnmck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"Brandon booked a tour for us. For the fall," Neal says, on a rushed exhale like he does when he's getting tattooed in a sensitive spot. For a minute, all Dave can do is blink. On the TV, the crowd cheers and the announcer seems excited about something, but Dave can't even remember whether they're at home or away. "The fall?" he says finally, stupidly. "This fall?"</i> If you love something, let it go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Take a breath (you'll need it where you're going)

**Author's Note:**

> The names are the only thing in this story that aren't fictional; otherwise, it's lies, all lies. Enormous thanks to the wonderful jehane_writes for a thorough and incredibly helpful beta in an impressively short time. Any remaining mistakes are entirely my own. Title stolen from MWK's "Song To Me." And I don't tag for secondary pairings, but this story also includes past Dave/Neal/OFC, and mention of Neal/Kira (no conflict). And finally, like all my fics in this fandom, this is for dugrival, the best partner in DCATA crime a girl could ask for. ♥ ♥ ♥

Dave is watching the Royals lose, which is weirdly comforting in its familiarity; in the hurricane of album promos, of Billboard predictions and single sales, he'll take all the comfort he can get. Still, "Fucking Hochevar," he mutters to Neal, who's sprawled on the other side of the couch with a mostly-full beer in his hand.

It's the same beer, in fact, that Neal's had in his hand for the last five innings, which is… not at all familiar, actually, nor particularly comforting. He also doesn't seem to be watching the game at all, just aiming a glassy-eyed stare in the general direction of the screen. He's been acting weird as hell for the past week, quiet and withdrawn, and Dave is suddenly done giving him space. It's tough-love time.

"Tiemann," he says.

Neal doesn't respond.

Dave reaches over and grabs the beer out of his hand.

"Hey! Get your own, asshole," Neal growls, snatching the bottle back.

"I have my own," Dave says mildly. "I just wanted your attention." He fully expects Neal to make a joke about _David Cook wanting attention, now there's a new one_ , but Neal just grunts and takes a long pull from the bottle.

Dave frowns. "Okay, now you're freaking me out. What's going on with you, man? Did you and Kira have a fight or something?"

Neal makes a noise that sounds like it's trying to be a laugh, but doesn't quite get there. "No." As Dave watches, Neal chugs the entirety of his beer, then lets his head fall back against the couch. "No, actually," he says to the ceiling, "Kira and I are going to start looking for a place together, I think."

"Oh." Dave lets that sink in for a second. He takes a swig of his own beer, more to fill the silence than anything else. "Oh. Okay. That's…" He nods, maybe a little too quickly, but it's not surprising, once he thinks about it. Neal's never really felt comfortable living rent-free at Dave's place, no matter how many times Dave tells him that it's his right as a member of the band, like health insurance or the very distant possibility of meeting Bjork.

And Kira has been astonishingly, awesomely not-weird about Neal and Dave being… whatever word encompasses "friends and bandmates and housemates who've also been fucking for the better part of the past year and half," so Dave's anxious to be equally not-weird about this latest development. He'll be spending months with Neal on a tour bus soon anyway, so it seems only fair that Kira get to spend as much time with him as possible when he's home.

"That's awesome," Dave says, once he finishes working through it in his brain. "Right on, dude, I'm psyched for you." Relief pushes a laugh out of his mouth. "Jesus, Doc, is that why you've been acting so weird? I thought you were pissed at me or something."

Neal still won't look at him, though. In the cool light from the TV, Dave can see his chest expand and contract, and his fingers tighten around the neck of the bottle. Then, "Brandon booked a tour for us. For the fall," Neal says, on a rushed exhale like he does when he's getting tattooed in a sensitive spot.

For a minute, all Dave can do is blink. On the TV, the crowd cheers and the announcer seems excited about something, but Dave can't even remember whether they're at home or away. "The fall?" he says finally, stupidly. " _This_ fall?"

"It's a festival tour," Neal says, and he does look over now, eyes as close to pleading as Dave's ever seen them. Neal's not really the type to beg. "This could be huge for us, and it's Brandon fucking Saller, and… I have to do this, okay? You know I wouldn't do it unless it was important. You _know_ that."

 _I thought I did_ , Dave thinks, but it feels far away, like he's in the middle of a frozen lake. His eyes flicker back to Neal's. "Kyle too?" he asks, because why not.

"No," Neal says hurriedly. "No, no, he's staying. And I'll stay until you can find a replacement, I swear."

"Well, you'll definitely be pretty easy to replace," Dave says, and he can't believe he's joking about this. He remembers cutting his finger down to the bone once, with one of his mom's incredibly sharp kitchen knives. He'd been cooking dinner in an ill-fated attempt to impress Ellen Carmichael, and the knife had slipped and he'd looked down and there had been nothing at first, no pain, no blood, and he'd thought for a few seconds that he was fine. Right up until he'd touched his finger to check and then promptly almost threw up.

Neal's watching him anxiously, a hesitant smile hovering at the corners of his mouth. "Yeah, I know," he says. "Seriously, though, David. I wish… I wish the timing was different."

"Hey, man," Dave replies, "just promise me: when you find you…."

"Oh, fuck you," Neal groans, smiling for real now, and his beer bottle thuds against the carpet as he slides across the couch and braces an arm across Dave's body. "I'm gonna miss the hell out of you," he murmurs, nosing along Dave's jaw to bite at the spot below his ear. Then his mouth is hot on Dave's, his tongue eager and familiar, his hands uncharacteristically clumsy as he jerks at the buttons on Dave's shirt. Dave lets himself sink into it, kissing back hard, chasing everything he can get, until the rising chorus of _you're leaving you're leaving **you're leaving**_ gets loud enough in his mind that his stomach gives a sharp, sick lurch and he pushes Neal away.

"You don't," he says, around what feel like spikes in his throat. "You don't have to apology-fuck me, dude."

Neal's face goes blank with shock, and his body goes rigid. Dave can just barely catch the vivid flare of hurt and something that might be guilt in his eyes before he levers himself up off the couch and walks out of the room without another word. A minute or so later, Dave hears the door to Neal's room slam shut.

Dave spends the night on the couch, watching the flickering reflection of infomercials on the ceiling while Dublin snores obliviously, a warm, snuffling weight against his chest. Of course, as soon as Andrew wanders upstairs in the morning (barely; the clock on the cable box reads 11:37 a.m.), yawning something that's vaguely shaped like "Hey," Dublin immediately leaps up and follows him into the kitchen, anxious for his walk. Then Andrew's gone again, taking both Dublin and Sixx with him, and Dave couldn't say exactly what he's been thinking during the last twelve or so hours, but apparently it's enough to propel him off the couch and down to Neal's room.

He pushes the door open without knocking, because he's hoping that much hasn't changed, at least. Neal's in bed, but his eyes are open, solemn and bleary and red-rimmed. There's an empty bottle of vodka next to the usual stack of books on his nightstand.

"Hey." Dave's own voice sounds harsh in his ears.

Neal sits up, scrubbing a hand through his hair. It's long and shaggy; the last time they'd all gone in for a meeting with the label, the A&R woman had given him a look like she'd just sucked on a lemon. From this angle, Dave can see the Hell or Highwater thunderbolt tattoo on the blade of Neal's hand, and thinks he probably should have seen this coming.

"Hi," Neal says.

 _Leaving leaving **leaving**_ , Dave's brain babbles. He clears his throat. "I just, uh. If you need any help looking for a place, let me know, okay?"

Neal looks at him for a long minute, then nods, carefully, like he's waiting for the other shoe to drop. "Okay, I will. Thanks."

"Okay." Dave lets his fingers drum against the doorframe. "I'm gonna go for a run, be back in a bit."

"Sure," Neal says.

Dave thinks he hears his own name as he shuts the door. But he's not trying to be a saint, he's just trying to not be a dick, so he doesn't go back to find out.

 

*****

 

 _His first rehearsal as an official member of MWK, and Dave is nervous._ Nervous. _Like he hasn't toured with these guys, hasn't known them for years, hasn't seen them stumbling sleepy-eyed to the shower on a dozen early mornings or stumbling home from the bar on several dozen late nights. But still, it feels like his first damn audition. He turns the gum over in his mouth, wraps it around his tongue. His fingers keep tapping against the side of his chair._

 _Andy's warming up at the mic, wailing his way through a few phrases of "Call to Arms." He's changed a hell of a lot in the time Dave's known him: he grabs the mic with authority now, like it belongs in his hand, and slants the occasional grin at the girls in the front row; he sings sweet and pure with his eyes half-closed or throws his head back to tear the notes from somewhere deep, somewhere raw, enough to raise the hairs on the back of Dave's neck as he bends over his bass. Hard to believe that Neal once had to pep-talk him before every gig._

 _"Hey," someone says, and Dave turns his head to see Neal standing just behind him, like Dave summoned him with the thought. Neal's watching Andy, too, and Dave knows him well enough by now to see the warmth and pride in the way his mouth tilts up at the corners._

 _"Hey," Dave answers, keeping it casual. Of course, the effort to keep it casual is exactly what's going to keep it from being casual, but what the fuck, the only way out is through, and also, tangentially, if it were possible to die from overanalyzing, he's pretty sure he'd be keeling over right about now. God, he's a loser._

 _Neal pokes him in the side of the head. "Hey. Are you freaking out?"_

 _Dave blinks—trust Neal to just slap it down on the table like that—but recovers quickly with a snort. "Are you kidding? I’m just so overwhelmed by the ambiance. Trying to take it all in." He gestures expansively at their rehearsal space: cracked concrete floor, a mini-fridge full of beer, blankets on all the walls to keep the sound from ricocheting back like friendly fire._

 _"Sorry we can’t accommodate you in the manner to which you’d like to become accustomed," Neal drawls, the dry echo of his days escorting debutantes, and Dave grins._

 _"Yeah, look into that, will ya?"_

 _"Yep, I’ll get right on it." Neal takes a long drink out of the beer can that’s dangling from his hand. Then, quietly, his eyes focused on Andy, "You sure this is gonna be cool with you?" It’s his serious voice, his_ this is my band and I can’t fuck it up _voice, and that’s strange in itself; Dave’s never heard that particular voice directed at him before._

 _And it hits him: he’s not in charge anymore._

 _Which is a relief, in a way, not to have that responsibility, that weight. But then there’s the other part, the part where he’s egomaniacal asshole enough that he’s never going to be able to stand behind Andy and not have at least some sharp tug behind his sternum that makes him want to lean forward, into the crowd, into the light. The fact is, if he stays with this band, he’s going to spend the next however-many years watching one of his best friends do what he wants to be doing. And it's not like he didn't know that going in, but here, sitting on the sidelines, no band of his own to go back to, it’s not quite what he expected._

 _"David?" Neal prompts._

 _Dave looks up at him, surprised—Neal rarely calls him by his first name like that, no nicknames, no irony—and sees the tense set of his shoulders as his eyes flick back and forth between Dave and Andy. Dave’s always known that if Neal had to choose, he’d choose Andy. They’ve been some bizarrely matched set since way before Dave met them, like salt and pepper shakers from a thrift store: Neal fair and profane and determined and Andy his dark snarky shadow, the voice to Neal’s words._

 _But Dave also remembers the way Neal looked when the habitual drunken_ so when are you gonna just fucking move here, you dumbass? _had been met with_ actually, funny you should mention that _, the quick pyrotechnic warmth of an unguarded, gleeful smile that had tipped Dave’s_ maybe _into_ definitely _before he knew it. He remembers Neal hauling Dave’s crap up three flights of stairs to their now-shared apartment, cussing him out the entire time for being a disorganized pansy-ass art major, and then leaving a six-pack in the fridge for him with a note that said_ welcome to hell _. He remembers the first time they wrote a song together, collapsed in the back of a crappy van in the middle of the night, shocked as shit when they were going their third round over some labored metaphor and they realized the sun was creeping over the horizon._

 _Andy’s watching, too, now, out of the corner of his eye, his voice going sloppy and distracted. He’s gripping the mic hard. Andy, with his sly-shy smile and his omnipresent camera and his voice like smoke and gold. Andy, who can make Dave laugh harder than just about anyone he’s not related to, and who always knows when to poke him out of an emo funk and when to let him wallow. And fuck it, Dave realizes, he’d fucking mop the floor for these guys if they asked him to, he just wants to_ be here _._

 _He answers Neal, but puts enough diaphragm into it that Andy can hear him, too. "Dude, chill. I’m sure."_

 _He’s half-expecting to have to repeat it, but Neal just looks at him closely and then nods, rocks back on his heels and takes another swig of beer. "Good," he says. "Because I’m not dragging all your shit down those stairs again."_

 _It's like leaning hard against a door and then having it pop open suddenly: the release of pressure is instantaneous, the giddy sensation of falling. "’Course," Dave goes on, struggling to keep the smile from stretching across his face, "when_ Analog Heart _goes platinum, fuck you guys, I’m outta here."_

 _Neal lets out a belch. "I’ll sue your ass for royalties."_

 _"They don’t let you smoke in court," Dave points out. "You’d never make it through the trial."_

 _"Hey, look, in the fantasy world where you go platinum, I can smoke in the courtroom if I want to. Maybe I’ll got a fucking unicorn to give me a light, too; that would be nice."_

 _Across the room, Andy's singing again, but he's doing it through a wide, shining grin, and one of Neal's hands drops down to rest at the back of Dave's neck, a quick squeeze and then just_ there _. His fingers are cold from the beer and the room's shitty insulation._

 _Dave leans into the touch, just barely. "Unicorns don’t have opposable thumbs."_

 _"You just got a degree in finger-painting," Neal shoots back, "what the fuck do you know?"_

 _They go on like that for a while, call and response, easy habit by now, until Josh hollers over that if they're not gonna rehearse, they can both be replaced. Dave's sure he got some zingers in there over the course of that conversation, but later, all he can remember is the steadying weight of Neal’s hand on the back of his neck._

 

*****

 

It's a frantic sprint to get ready, made even more frantic by a series of incredibly rushed auditions; before Dave knows it, he's living on a bus again.

And at some point along the way, he's taken to referring to "Come Back To Me" as "the Bullshit Pansy-Ass Song." Unfortunately, it's also a bullshit pansy-ass single, so he's stuck with it on the setlist whether he likes it or not, and that includes the acoustic set he's supposed to play the next day at WKRSomething in West Somewhere. Acoustic performances have always freaked him out, just him and his voice dangling out there exposed; that's at least half of why he always used to drag Neal with him, because that way he knew at least the guitar would sound good. Not that it sounds any less good when Andy's playing, or Devin, but it's just one more change, one more hole to patch, and right now, he's fucking sick of it. Dave sets his fingers to the ugliest not-chord he can find and strums despondently.

"Wow, that's sounding awesome," says Andy, hovering in the doorway to the lounge, his own acoustic slung around his neck.

Dave looks up at him with mock enthusiasm. "Right? Yeah, so I probably won't need you tomorrow, I've got this covered."

"Cool, great, I can use that time to file my nails." Andy swings himself down on the couch next to Dave. Kyle shuffles in behind him and takes a seat on the wooden box that serves as an end-table.

"Is this an intervention?" Dave asks. "Because if it is, we should probably film it."

"Yessss," Kyle agrees, thumping the end-table for emphasis. "Let's do some of that Metallica 'witness my pain' shit."

Andy shakes his head. "No way. No therapy videos until at least your fifth year as a band, don't you guys know how this works?"

"Oh, _right_ ," Dave says. "The third anniversary is the VH-1 Behind the Music anniversary. I always forget."

"I got you a penguin," Kyle says, and bursts out giggling at his own joke, even though Dave—and, from the look on his face, Andy—has no idea how he got from point A to point 9, there.

Dave reaches out to ruffle his hair. "Okay, Peekaboo, whatever you say."

"Anyway," Andy continues, "Kyle and I know how psyched you are about singing 'Come Back To Me'—"

"—The Bullshit Pansy-Ass Song—" Dave interrupts.

"—The Dave Is Less Mature Than Hayden Song," Andy amends without missing a beat, "so we thought maybe we'd try a new arrangement."

Dave sighs. The last thing he wants to do is to go through the fucking thing again, but he grits his teeth and nods. "Okay. What the hell, it can't get any worse."

"Thanks," Andy says dryly, but he starts in with the opening chords, and Dave closes his eyes, takes a breath, and tries to remember when he'd liked this song.

He gets through the first verse, and it's… fine, Andy's reliable as always, and Kyle is tapping on the box between his legs in a soft, steady rhythm, and it's not earth-shattering, but it's cool, Dave could be into it. Then he gets to the chorus and Kyle sneaks in, with a soaring harmony so perfect and so clear above the simple accompaniment that it almost startles Dave into silence. He keeps it together, though, and then Andy's with him on the first line of the second verse, there and gone, like a quick burst of sun through the clouds. By the time they get to the second-to-last chorus, it's all three of them harmonizing together, with Kyle's gentle rhythm underneath, and Dave's chest is tight; it's a gift he didn't know he needed, and even when he finishes the last lines by himself, he doesn't actually feel like he's alone.

He finds himself grinning at Andy as they strum the final notes together, and before the sound has even faded, he's gushing. "Awesome, you guys. Fucking _awesome_."

"Sweet!" Kyle holds out a hand to high-five Andy over Dave's head. "So are you gonna stop bitching about playing it now?"

"Never," Dave says dramatically, then, his hands going back to the strings like they've been magnetized, "Let's run through it again."

Which they do, but it's a formality, really; they've all played the song a hundred times, and now that they know what they're going for, it all slots together seamlessly. When they finish, applause erupts from the bunks, and Monty yells, "Freebiiiiiird!", which probably means there's also beer in his bunk.

"We'll be here all week!" Kyle calls back to them.

"And then the week after that!" Andy puts in. "Because we live here!"

Dave braces his forehead against the neck of his guitar and laughs until he can feel tears gathering at the corners of his eyes. "Oh, man," he says. "I needed that." He lets the last few chuckles bubble themselves out, then takes a deep breath and wipes his face. "Thank you guys," he says, looking back and forth between them. "I don't deserve you."

"Damn right," Kyle says. Then he thumps the box one last time and stands up. "I'm gonna go… um. Do. A thing." By which he clearly means "steal one of each pair of Devin's socks," or something similar, if the gleam in his eyes is any indication—Kyle has been enjoying no longer being the new kid way, way too much. And Dave would warn him about the inevitable retribution that's coming down the pike for him, judging by the increasingly speculative looks that Devin keeps giving Kyle's iPad, but that wouldn't be nearly as much fun.

"Good luck with that," he tells Kyle instead, and Kyle grips Dave's shoulder once and then practically skips back to the bunks.

"You know what _is_ bullshit about that song?" Andy says after a minute.

Dave raises an eyebrow at him. Andy hasn't been particularly supportive of his renaming campaign. "What?"

"The whole, 'I'll be right here waiting' part," Andy replies. "Putting your life on hold, waiting for things to go back to the way they were." His tone is gentle, without the slightest shade of mockery or even teasing, so Dave can't even pretend they're not talking about what they're talking about.

"Easy for you to say," he says, the words distorted around the sudden lump in his throat. "You've been with the same girl for years."

"Yeah," Andy says, smiling his involuntary Jennie smile, "because we each have our own lives. Besides," he goes on, and his eyes skip away, down toward the golden glow of his guitar, "just because I wasn't sleeping with him doesn't mean I don't miss him, too."

It kind of cuts Dave off at the knees; he's been pretty wrapped up in his own issues, but of course he's not be the only one with holes that need to be patched, here. "Dude, I'm…." he starts, and then he just figures _fuck it_ and reaches out to pull Andy into a hug. It's not the best angle, with their guitars between them, but Andy leans into it willingly, his hand warm and reassuring on the back of Dave's head; Andy's a champion hugger, which is one of Dave's favorite things about him, though it would be a serious Man Law violation to tell him that. Dave holds on hard, then rubs Andy's back a couple of times, and lets him go.

"I don't think 'I hope you find everything that you need, I'll be wherever I need to be to live my own healthy, self-actualized life,' is really going to scan, though," he says as he sits back, and Andy laughs.

 

*****

 

 _The room is all vivid colors and blurs, like looking at a kaleidoscope through a Vaseline lens. But it's hard to miss it when the girl straddling Neal's lap on the couch bends back, back, back along his thighs and crooks a finger at Dave with a wicked, upside-down grin._

 _"C'mere, David."_

 __Ho-ly shit. __

 _She's… he's not exactly sure, someone's girlfriend's cousin or something; her name is Kate and she'd been out to dinner with them before the show and she'd smiled at him and commiserated about the shitty Madden Football season he was having and he'd thought_ maybe _. But then after the show she'd gone straight for Neal and he'd figured that was it—lead guitar beats bass guitar, just like paper beats rock, illogical but fucking immutable law._

 _Obviously whoever'd invented rock-paper-scissors hadn't considered the threesome option._

 _"Dude," she says. "Limited-time offer. Get over here."_

 _Dave glances at Neal, but Neal is… well, the technical term is "trashed off his everloving ass," all half-raised eyebrows and probably with at least one foot in another dimension, so. No argument there. No help, either, which Dave is feeling like he maybe possibly needs, because he's fantasized, sure, but in his fantasies there were usually more women and fewer best friends, and also he'd been a lot more of the rugged Springsteen type, and—_

 _"Five…" she says teasingly, rolling slowly up in some sort of gravity-defying… whoa. "Four… three… two…"_

 _"Okay," he says, and stumbles the few steps to her. She fists a hand in the front of his t-shirt and drags him down for an off-center kiss. He gets mostly her cheek at first, then finds her mouth and there, that's more like it—she tastes like Jagermeister, rich and sticky, and running underneath that is a smoky taste that he realizes with a shock must be Neal. Dave moans into her mouth; with his hand on her waist, he can feel it when she rolls her hips, drawing an answering gasp out of Neal._

 _Dave has absolutely no idea what the rules are here—there's still a party happening in the next room, and the corner they're in isn't brightly lit, but it's not completely dark, either, and also, there are_ three _of them, what the hell—so he just keeps kissing her, sinking to his knees behind her to ease the awkward angle on his back. He's more aware than he wants to be of Neal's knees on either side of him, but he doesn't touch, doesn't cross any lines, focusing on the sweet slide of Kate's tongue in his mouth. She's set up a steady motion, rocking into Neal, and just over the music from the background, Dave can hear the rhythmic rasp of Neal's breath. Dave is rock-hard in his jeans; it's a conscious effort not to start rubbing up against Kate's back, which the very tiny still-functioning part of his brain informs him would be ungentlemanly, and this may be the only threesome he ever gets—he's going to be a gentleman, dammit._

 _Kate pulls her mouth away from his with a satisfied humming noise, and smiles up at him—her eyes are slate grey, and hazy with pleasure—before leaning forward to kiss Neal again. Dave might be disappointed, except that in the same motion, she drags his hand from her hip up to her breast, so the exchange is completely, totally, one hundred percent okay with him._

 _She's full and soft in his hand, filling his palm and then some, and Dave rests his forehead against the back of her neck as he catches her nipple between his middle and ring fingers to make her squirm. She smells like citrus, and like sweat, too, sparking an animal tug low in Dave's belly, making his hips twitch forward, just short of contact. The back of his hand is pressed up against Neal's chest, so he can feel the rapid, uneven thud of Neal's heart. It's comforting, in a way, something familiar in the middle of this incredibly hot and incredibly strange situation, which is probably why Dave feels his own heartbeat accelerate in response, like playing to a metronome. That's… yeah. That's got to be it._

 _Before Dave's brain can wander too far down that path, Kate pulls his hand from her breast and down between her legs, up under her skirt to where she's, oh holy_ fuck _, hot and wet, even through the cotton of her panties. Dave hesitates, unsure how far he's supposed to go, but Kate leans back, rests her head on his shoulder, and whispers, "Fuck me, c'mon," in his ear, her mouth wet with his saliva and Neal's._

 _Dave figures that's a pretty clear sign._

 _And he may have no idea what he's doing here in general, but he does know how to do_ this _. He pulls his hand up far enough to slide it underneath the waistband of her underwear, and she shivers and makes a tiny hitching noise in his ear. Just a little further down, and she's so wet, Jesus, she's so wet; she arches back against him and gasps as he rubs her clit, gently at first, then harder when she tips her hips up toward him. After a few seconds, she makes a frustrated, desperate noise and brings her legs up to brace her feet against the couch, scooting forward on Neal's thighs, angling back to let Dave support more of her weight as her knees fall open. It's as helpful as a map, and Dave follows it eagerly, slipping one finger inside her, watching the rise and fall of her tits as he touches her, the fabric of her skirt bunched around his wrist._

 _"Yeah," she moans, drawn-out, against his ear. "Yeah, yes, more…"_

 _Two fingers, then, and fuck, she's so tight, so slick, muscles clenching around him, clit pressed against the heel of his hand. She starts moving her hips in time with his thrusts, and Neal makes a sharp, choked-off sound. Dave looks up automatically before he realizes that eye contact is probably not the best way to make this less awkward, but fortunately, Neal's head is tipped back against the cushions and his eyes are closed, his hands clenched tight around Kate's hips. Each shift is bringing her ass in contact with Neal's dick, and Dave stares for a long moment—at the angle of Neal's Adam's apple where it stands out from his throat, at the barely-visible curve of his bottom lip as he pants at the ceiling—before he realizes what he's doing and hides his head in Kate's neck again._

 __Kate _, he thinks,_ Kate Kate Kate _, and it's not exactly difficult to focus on her, the way she's writhing against his chest, against his hand. "Yeah, like that—yes—oh god, oh_ fuck _," she's chanting, like his own personal porn soundtrack, and Dave listens as closely as he's ever listened to any song he loves, picking up any cue he can to make it good for her. Distantly, he's aware that his knees are starting to hurt, shifting against the paper-thin carpet, but he can barely feel the pain. He's holding his breath, concentrating, lost in the sounds she's making and the way she's contracting around him; he knows she's getting close, and he lifts his sweaty forehead from her neck to murmur against the soft skin of her shoulder, "C'mon, that's it, c'mon, yes," as he slips his free hand underneath her shirt to roll her nipple between his finger and thumb. That does it: she tenses, flails up and yanks hard at the neck of his t-shirt, and comes all over his hand._

 _And as she's shuddering, the angle of her hips changes enough to bring Dave's knuckles into contact with Neal's cock, just for a second. Neal jerks forward with a groan, burying his head against Kate's collarbone as he comes, too, shaking against her._

 _Kate makes that humming noise again, this time broken up by a giggle, and she moves her hand from Dave's shoulder to behind his neck and yanks him down for a sloppy kiss while she reaches back with her other hand to rub against his crotch. The sudden friction after the long, aching wait is like a hundred volts straight to his dick; it takes all of about four strokes through his jeans before he's coming so hard that he could swear he can feel it all the way out to his fingerprints._

 _There's a short, sweaty silence afterwards, which Dave uses to attempt to reconstruct his brain. Between the alcohol and the orgasm, that's kind of a challenge, and he pretty much only gets as far as the realization that he knows even less about post-threesome protocol than he does about mid-threesome protocol. He's still got two fingers inside Kate, and he's honestly not sure which is ruder: pulling them out or leaving them there. He can feel a highly inappropriate giggle-fit lurking at the back of his throat, but Kate rescues him, again: she kisses Neal on the top of the head and pushes him gently back against the couch, then wiggles her hips until Dave withdraws his fingers. She proceeds to suck his fingers into her mouth—Dave's dick twitches despite the rapidly-cooling mess in his shorts;_ don't be greedy _, he thinks sternly at it while Kate licks him clean—and then kisses him, too, on the cheek. She stands up, grinning, doing a quick shimmy to settle her skirt around her legs again._

 _"Well. Thanks, you guys."_

 _Dave struggles to his feet. "Can I call you?" he blurts out, then realizes he's not sure if he's getting in Neal's way, here. "I mean—can we—" He glances at Neal, who looks dazed, and clearly not sure of the post-threesome protocol, either, which is reassuring._

 _Kate laughs—loud and open; he likes that—and leans forward to kiss him again, on the mouth this time, her hand cupping his jaw. "Tell you what: you guys are ever back in town, I'll be there. Okay?"_

 _She pats him on the cheek, then dances out of the room._

 _And leaves Dave and Neal staring at each other, to a soundtrack of what Dave is pretty sure is the Spice Girls. This is… not how he expected his night to go._

 _"So," he says after approximately a second and a half, because he's not great with silent staring under the best of circumstances. Something in him is hollering for a high-five, but. Gentlemanly, dammit. "I'm just gonna…" He makes a vague gesture to indicate_ do something about the jizz in my pants _, which is something he feels is best left to vagueness._

 _"Yeah," Neal says. "Me too."_

 _"Cool." Dave nods jerkily, and heads off in search of a bathroom._

 _He doesn't see Neal again until the party room has—eventually—become the sleeping room, and Neal trudges down the stairs and drops his sleeping bag next to Dave's. It's a tradition that Dave wasn't sure would be continuing, under the circumstances, but Neal settles in just like he does every time, and Dave can feel the tension draining out of his own body. If Neal's not going to be freaked out about this, then Dave doesn't have to be, either._

 _On Dave's other side, Andy twitches in his sleep and makes a wordless noise. Then he sits up, says very clearly, "Tell the peanut butter it's open," and collapses back down again._

 _Dave looks over at Neal, wide-eyed, and they both crack up, trying desperately to muffle their hilarity in their pillows._

 _"Oh my god, I wish I'd recorded that," Dave whispers when he can breathe again._

 _"Me too," Neal says. "What if it's a secret code?"_

 _"Oh shit," Dave gasps, laughing harder as the absurdity of the whole night sneaks up and smacks him over the back of the head. "Dude._ Dude _, what are we doing? Sleeping in some random person's basement while Andy has secret code dreams about peanut butter?"_

 _Neal's grin flashes wide. "Tour," he says simply._

 _"Yeah," Dave agrees. At the moment, that seems like a good answer to damn near everything. Except the way his hip is digging into the floor; the carpet is about a millimeter thick, and it's all freezing-ass concrete underneath. He shifts, trying to find a more comfortable position. "Wouldn't mind a bed, though."_

 _"Yeah." Neal gives a jaw-cracking yawn, and his eyes drift shut. "But the hurt's how you know it's real," he mumbles. He's clearly sinking toward sleep already._

 __Says the guy who just got totally non-painfully laid _, Dave thinks, amused. Neal's cowboy romanticism still surprises him sometimes; Dave's never sure if Neal is trying to prove something, or earn the lonely music he loves, or if it's just woven into his blood somehow. Regardless, it's part of what makes Neal, Neal, and Dave grins fondly in the dark. Neal's soft snores are his only response; for an insomniac, he always drops off like a rock once he finally gets there._

 _Andy doesn't seem to have any more dramatic announcements to share, but he has started to shiver, so Dave scoots over until he's close enough to share some body heat. "Well," he says to no one. "_ I _wouldn't mind a bed."_

 

*****

 

They're at the venue, and then they're at a bar, and Dave's not entirely sure how they got from one to the other, but he feels like it's safe to blame Kira. Across the table, Neal and Devin are lining up a dangerous-looking number of whiskey shots, and Dave is starting to think this could end badly.

"Oh my god, they're totally going to fight for your honor," Kira giggles gleefully in his ear, over the sound of Ozzy on the jukebox.

Dave jabs his elbow into her side. Not very hard, because—his apparent total inability to act normally around Neal aside—he's actually really glad to see her, but. "Shut the fuck up."

Kira just wraps both arms around his elbow and hangs on. "No way, this is some serious Scarlett O'Hara shit, here."

"Fuck," Dave groans, tipping his head back to stare at the ceiling, which is wooden and has spurs and what look like cages of some kind dangling from it. Trust Kira to find the only metal S&M honky-tonk bar in San Diego. He's supposed to be on tour alcohol rations now to protect his voice, and technically he's still got a cold, but there's no way he's getting through this sober—he grabs his beer mug and gulps while Neal and Devin pound back their second round.

"Yes!" shouts Devin as he thumps his shotglass down decisively. He's grinning his loose, ready grin; as far as Dave can tell, Devin pretty much assumes everyone is cool until proven dickish, and obviously Neal is no exception. Devin is chill, sarcastic, sweet in a wicked kind of way, and has played to sold-out arenas in more countries than Dave can count on both hands, and still, Dave's not sure he has any idea what he's getting into here.

Neal is also smiling, but he has a granite glint in his eyes that Dave remembers from more than one near-fight in more than one bar in the Midwest; he can almost see the devil on Neal's shoulder, whispering. He knows he should probably stop this, knows he should be pissed at Neal, even—Neal's the one who fucking left, after all, so he's got no right to be possessive or competitive or whatever the hell he's being now, but…. Neal fucking _left_ , and Dave is pathetic enough that he wants to see this play out for a while.

They shoot back the third round, and then Monty throws an arm across the table, between them and the remaining shotglasses. "I'm calling intermission," he says. "You may be on a break, Tiemann, but we're not, and I'd rather not get acquainted with Devin's internal organs for at least a few more weeks."

"Why, Monty, I thought you'd never ask," says Devin, with what Dave's fairly certain is an attempt to bat his eyelashes, but what with the bourbon, it looks more like he's blinking in Morse code. As interpreted by Jack Sparrow.

"Fine by me," Neal agrees, sprawling back in his chair, sipping from his own beer mug.

Kira murmurs, "I'll be back," in Dave's ear, kisses him on the cheek, and goes over to slide into Neal's lap. Neal wraps an arm around her and settles her more comfortably without ever looking away from Andy, who's telling some story about high school and Neal and a rented trombone.

Watching them, Dave feels a corkscrew of jealousy in his gut. Not because Kira and Neal are dating, exactly; strangely enough, Neal had turned out to be the biggest thing Dave and Kira have ever had in common. She'd always been Andrew's friend more than Dave's, but when she and Neal had hooked up, she'd dragged Dave out for their first solo drinks ever, poured about a gallon of beer and no small amount of tequila down his throat, and informed him, "When he's with you, he's with you, when he's with me, he's with me; the threesome option is not on the table at this time; if either of us has an issue, we talk about it, no passive-aggressive bullshit; and no matter what, we stay friends. Agreed?"

"Agreed," Dave had told her, a little in awe and wishing, suddenly, that they could renegotiate the whole threesome thing. And from then on out it had been mostly mutual appreciation when Neal shredded out an especially badass solo, or mutual frustration over his insanely over-organized DVD collection, or whatever. Now, though, Dave looks at the way Neal's thumb is rubbing along Kira's hip and it itches like a burr underneath his skin: the fact that since that night on Dave's couch, Neal hasn't touched him for anything more than a brief, awkward hug the day he'd left; the fact that Kira can be with Neal in public and Dave can't be with him anywhere; the fact that Neal had been in front of the stage earlier and not on it, that Dave had split off from Devin on the bridge of "Bar-ba-sol" and walked straight into the heat of Neal's gaze boring into him from the shadows of the security lane. And all at once, he's so fucking _angry_ , that he'd just barely managed to stop looking over his shoulder for Neal everywhere they go, everywhere they play, and now Neal's across the table from him again, here but not-here, like a tornado spinning through and then disappearing into thin air.

"Fuck you," he mutters into his mug, feeling the echo of it bounce back against his mouth, and takes another long drink.

His vision is going liquid around the edges by the time Neal and Devin get back to the shots. They're toasting _to_ things now: "To the Flying V!" Neal offers, prompting Devin to counter with, "To Jeff Beck!", and Dave can see the edge in Neal's eyes wearing down with every new square inch of common ground. Then Devin—who is about seventeen sheets to the wind, if his half-mast eyelids are any indication—slurs at the top of his lungs, "To David Cook!" and Dave could swear that everyone at the table stops breathing. Actually, he's vaguely surprised that the jukebox doesn't grind to a halt with a record-scratch squeal.

He glances across the table, planning just a quick flick of his eyes over and then down, like a squeamish kid checking to see if the gory scene in a horror movie is over yet. It's long enough to see Neal looking back at him, though, and Dave sort of gets stuck, caught in the bright blue tractor beam. Then he panics, afraid of what he's going to see, and covers by throwing an arm over Devin's shoulders.

"Thanks, man," he says, clinking his mug against Devin's empty shotglass. "How you doing?"

"Fine," Devin answers sunnily. His head lolls back onto Dave's shoulder. "I'm doing _fine_."

Well, he's a hell of a cheerful drunk, which is a pretty great quality in a bandmate, as far as Dave's concerned. He chuckles and shakes Devin gently. "Maybe it's time to get back."

"It's _early_!" Devin insists. "I'm getting to know my predecess… predece… precedess… goddammit."

"Predecessor," Neal puts in from across the table, enunciating deliberately.

Devin levels an unsteady finger at him. "Yessss! See, it's working already."

But Neal pushes back from the table; when Dave looks up, Kira has slipped out of Neal's lap and is looking back and forth between him and Dave, an exasperated crease between her perfectly sculpted eyebrows.

"We've got a long drive back," Neal says. "You still coming, Skibby?"

Andy's playing the same game of eyeball tennis that Kira is, but he gulps down the rest of his beer. "Yeah, sure." He's heading back to L.A. to work on some final touches for the new MWK EP; they'll pick him up tomorrow on their way through to Pomona. Dave wishes that didn't feel so much like choosing sides at the moment—not for his own sake, for once, because in this case it's not actually an either-or proposition, but for Andy's sake, since he transparently hates being caught in the middle. Andy sighs and starts digging in his pockets for cash.

"I'll get the tab," Dave says, catching his eye, telegraphing _it's cool_ with everything he's got.

"Well, in that case." Neal holds up his last shotglass, amber liquid sloshing over the side. "To RC-fuckin'-A," and he salutes Dave with it, then drains it down.

Dave's whole body flushes hot, then cold, his beer going sour in his stomach. The bar seems to have turned into a minefield at some point in the last ten minutes, and more than anything, he just wants out. "Time for bed," he announces, shoving his own chair back. "C'mon, buddy." He hooks Devin's arm around his neck and drags him to a moderately upright position.

"I thought I was going to bed with Monty." Devin shakes his head. "Man, it's hard to keep up with you guys." Then he stumbles out from under Dave's arm, far enough to offer his hand to Neal. "Pleasure meeting you, dude."

Neal's cheeks are still stained red under his freckles, but he looks amused in spite of himself. The part of Dave that hasn't lost his sense of humor can sympathize; it's hard to be pissed off at a drunk dude who's beaming at you without a care in the world. Neal shakes Devin's hand. "You too, man."

Kira, meanwhile, pushes a heavy Ziploc bag into Dave's hands: chocolate chunk cookies, his favorite. Typical Kira, crisis management through baking. When she hugs him, the spicy-sweet scent of her perfume reminds him of dozens of nights in his house in L.A., all of them sitting around his kitchen table bullshitting until the wee hours. He squeezes her tighter. "Thanks, Kira von Kira," he murmurs into her hair, co-opting Andrew's nickname for her.

"He wouldn't have stuck it out so long for anyone but you, y'know," she says quietly. And Dave appreciates the sentiment, he really does, but at the moment, it feels kind of like getting kicked in the balls with expensive boots: nice window dressing, but doesn't make a lot of difference in the result.

He presses a kiss to her temple, then pulls away. "Drive safe. Bring back my guitarist in one piece," he adds, louder, for Andy's benefit. Andy winks and shoots him finger-guns. Sympathetic finger-guns, if such a thing were possible, and that's it, Dave is _done_ with this circus.

"Thanks for coming," he says to Neal, because not saying anything at all would be even more awkward, and Neal did drive three hours just for this. What "this" is, exactly, Dave's not sure, but he's obviously not going to figure it out tonight.

"Thanks for the show," says Neal, which could also mean any number of things; from the look on his face, _he_ might not even be completely sure what he means. Dave nods, like an idiot, and then—after glancing over to make sure that Monty has taken over Drunk-Ass Lead Guitarist Duty—beats a hasty retreat to the front of the bar to pay the tab, and then out into the dry San Diego night, without looking back.

 

*****

 

 _"To the American fucking Idol!" Andy shouts, for probably the fifteenth time that night, and Neal and Joey and Kyle all pound the table and chorus right back, "To the heartthrob!" and take long, triumphant swigs of beer. Dave can't help feeling like even the bottoms of their glasses are smirking at him. And it's not like he doesn't_ know _that he sold his soul a little bit and thereby signed up for years and years of shit from his musician friends, but he's coming off a solid three weeks of travel and appearances and PR bullshit and meetings with RCA and all he'd wanted tonight was a few bonding drinks with his new band. And considering that his soul is currently footing their exponentially increasing bar tab, he thinks they could cut him some fucking slack._

 _He suddenly wants to call Carly, or Mike, or Archie; the list of people who really understand what he's gone through in the past year is frustratingly short, and he hates that, hates that he's not sure right now whether he knows Andy and Neal any better than he knows Kyle or Joey. With the exception of performing, everything he does these days feels like tap-dancing on quicksand, and his friends and family are supposed to be his solid ground. He doesn't know how to deal with the prospect of that not being the case._

 __Don't be stupid, _he tells himself firmly, and tries to muster up a laugh as the other guys' glasses hit the table again. "Thank you, you are indeed in the presence of greatness," he says. "So, okay, I figure a few more rehearsals and—"_

 _"Hey. You're that American Idol dude?"_

 _Dave closes his eyes for half a second, praying for calm, before turning a smile on the new guy. Who turns out to be wearing an Ed Hardy shirt and factory-distressed boots that probably cost more than Dave's first guitar, with a barbed-wire tattoo stretched across spray-tanned biceps and a sneer sprawled across his face._ Fucking L.A., _Dave thinks,_ even the dive bars are trendy, _but he holds out his hand anyway. "Hey. I'm Dave Cook."_

 _Ed Hardy pokes a finger into Dave's shoulder. "You're a fucking sellout."_

 _Dave's never really been much for fights, but adrenaline blooms in his veins and his vision actually goes kind of hazy around the edges. He can see the TMZ tagline now, though,_ Cook cooks up trouble at L.A. bar _, so he keeps one hand clenched tight on the back of his chair and the smile pasted on his face. "So I guess you didn't vote for me, huh?"_

 _"Like I'd fucking vote for that stupid fucking show," Ed slurs. "I only know who you are 'cuz my girlfriend watches it."_

 __Just keep telling yourself that _, Dave answers in his head, where he gets a brief and vivid mental image of the punching and yelling and overturned tables that are likely to lie at the end of that road. It's satisfying for an instant, but then a wave of exhaustion washes over him and he feels hollow and stupid and he just wants to go home. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a crumpled ten dollar bill. "Look, man. You're entitled to your opinion. Why don't you grab yourself a drink, on me, and we'll agree to disagree. Okay?"_

 _Ed looks at the ten, then at Dave, then the ten, then mutters, "Sellout," one more time and grabs the bill from Dave's hand. He lurches off toward the bar._

 _Dave doesn't really want to face his bandmates at this particular juncture, so he half-turns around but keeps his eyes on the beer-sticky lacquered wood grain of the table. "Hey, I think that's my cue for the night, guys, but I gotta take a leak first." Before anyone can answer, he shoves back from the table and heads toward the bathroom without looking back._

 _Once he's in there, it's tempting to splash water on his face and stare searchingly into the mirror like a good angst-ridden hero. But the bar's commitment to its image definitely extends to the bathroom and therefore it doesn't look like the sink's been cleaned in a while, plus Dave's hair is kind of a delicate balance these days, so he decides to forego that part and ends up just kind of standing there instead. He pulls out his phone and cycles past all his Idol friends' numbers, and skips quickly over Andy's and Neal's like they can hear him somehow; all his Midwest friends are probably asleep, and so is his mom, which is what barely keeps him from pressing the call button and truly resigning himself to pathetitude._

 _"Jesus, Cook, get it together," he mutters. He jams his phone back in his pocket, washes his hands at the sketchy sink, and heads back out to the bar._

 _His bandmates are gone; he has a quick lurch of hurt that they abandoned him like some middle-school prank victim, but he takes a deep breath and tells himself that they're probably outside—Neal hasn't had a smoke in a while, and they probably all went out to keep him company. Dave signs for the tab, retrieves his shiny new credit card, and ducks out the back door._

 _Where he's greeted by the sight of Ed Hardy Guy, backed up against the alley wall with a tattooed finger drilling into his chest._

 _"—one of the best fucking musicians I've ever worked with," Neal is growling, centimeters from Ed's face, "and he works his fucking ass off, and you don't have a fucking clue what he's been through to get where he is. He's about a hundred fucking times the man you'll ever be, motherfucker. So if you want a piece of him, you come through me."_

 _"Come through_ us _," Andy corrects from his spot a few inches behind Neal, and Kyle adds, "Hell, yeah," while Joey nods fiercely. There's something just slightly hilarious about the whole thing, this poor poser cornered by such a motley crew; Dave seriously doubts that Joey even has the attention span for a fight. But Dave can tell even in the half-light that they all mean it, from their clenched fists to their narrowed eyes, and it sets his own eyes burning. Which is exactly what they_ don't _need right now, so he clears his throat and takes a couple of steps closer._

 _"Hey, Tiemann," he says mildly. "I thought we agreed, no more hitting brick walls."_

 _"Yeah, I know," Neal answers. He taps Ed Hardy's forehead. "Does feel pretty hard."_

 _Dave steps even closer. "C'mon. We've got to get back to my luxurious sellout mansion; the Playboy bunnies are waiting."_

 _"Sweet," says Joey, then fakes a punch toward Ed Hardy. Objectively, it's not the most threatening punch in the world—in fact, Dave strongly suspects him of stealing it from_ The Karate Kid _—but Hardy is drunk enough to go for it; he flings himself to the side and takes off running. Or stumbling, more precisely, but it's getting him down the alley, anyway._

 _They all watch him go in silence; when he's disappeared around a corner, Kyle says solemnly, "Guess he was an Archie fan."_

 _There's a half-second where the words seem to hover in midair, and then they all collapse into hysterical laughter._

 _"Man, I love this band already," Joey wheezes after a few minutes, his arm anchored around Kyle's neck to keep him from falling over. He presses his knees together. "Oh, shit, I'm gonna pee."_

 _Kyle shoves him away. "Dude! Not cool!" but he's still laughing, too, choking the words out between helpless giggles._

 _"C'mon," Dave manages between his own gasps. "Let's get out of here before you guys start a gang war. I've got a half-rack of beer at my place."_

 _"Sold," Andy says immediately, and they make their way out to the front of the bar to start the laborious process of hailing a cab._

 _As soon as they get to the curb, Andy and Kyle start fighting over whether it would help to show some leg, with Joey offering arguments both for and against with no apparent rhyme or reason, all while cabs whizz by on the street behind them. It's entirely possible they're going to die waiting on this corner. Dave looks over at Neal, standing next to him with his hands in the pockets of his ratty denim jacket._

 _"Thanks for defending my honor," Dave tells him, grinning._

 _Neal gives him a sly smirk back. "Anytime, princess."_

 _"Seriously, though," Dave adds. "I…" He gets a sudden swell of sentiment; he's too drunk for this. "I'm so glad you're here, dude. I'd be screwed if you weren't."_

 _Neal pulls him into something right at the tipping point between hug and headlock. "And miss all this? Are you kidding me?" he drawls._

 _Dave makes the unilateral decision that it's a hug after all, and holds on as long as he can._

 

*****

 

Finding someone to play Neal's parts onstage is one thing, and finding someone to fill his place in Dave's bed isn't even a consideration at this point, but that leaves a lot of ground unclaimed in the middle: setlists, contracts, schedules—all the organizational shit that Dave hates and that Neal gets off on—not to mention a sounding board for nearly every decision Dave makes. Musically, he's always trusted Neal's opinion more than he trusts his own, and without him, Dave feels like he's trying to navigate rapids without oars; every time he turns around, it seems like there's another eddy waiting for him.

Of course, he's hardly alone in this boat, and the rest of the band helps as much as they can—Andy takes over Musical Director duties without a murmur, and Dave institutes Setlist Campfires, which are not so much campfires as beer- and junk-food-fueled bullshitting and brainstorming sessions that are as likely to end in games of Cornhole as they are in an actual setlist. But the work does get done, eventually, and Dave chalks the rest up to band bonding, which is every bit as important to him.

The contracts are more of a challenge. Sure, Dave technically has a manager for exactly this kind of shit, but Neal had always insisted on reading everything for himself, and he'd caught enough errors and loopholes and potential pitfalls over time that Dave knows it's worth the effort. He doesn't have Neal's natural OCD, though, or quite his powers of bullshit detection. And with the added load of the meet-and-greets, he ends up spending way too many nights blinking blearily at fine print, tiny letters running inside his closed eyelids like ants when he tries to fall asleep, until he's half-ready to torch every stack of paper he sees.

He sticks with it, though, and eventually he squints less and understands more. And on the day he finally catches a mistake—three percent instead of the four percent they'd renegotiated, and if the label had wanted to hold him to it, it could have added up to thousands of dollars, for him and the band—he wants to throw himself a fucking parade.

"I'm a genius!" he announces, emerging proudly from his bunk. The rest of the band is gathered in the back lounge; Andy and Devin are re-stringing guitars, with Kyle and Monty offering color commentary from the sidelines while _Fletch_ plays on the TV.

"Four percent!" Dave crows. He stabs an enthusiastic finger at the page in his hand. "Four percent, motherfuckers!"

"Fuckin' A," Kyle offers, in the tone he usually reserves for Dave's Sudoku breakthroughs, a tone that implies absolutely no interest whatsoever in what Dave is talking about.

Dave flings himself down on the couch and prepares to slack the slacking of the just. "Four percent," he repeats. "I'm a genius. Just so you know."

"'Course you are," Andy says patronizingly, muffled through the string in his mouth.

Devin looks up from his guitar—Dave's guitar, actually, now that he looks at it; he appreciates that—and tosses Dave a package of Oreos. "Campfire later?" he asks.

Dave looks around: at his band, at the stupid piece of paper in his hand, at this little empire they're building, here with their torn couch and their crappy indoor-outdoor carpet. He tears open the Oreos. "Fuck yeah."

 

*****

 

 _"Last chance to back out," Neal says from behind him, hand hovering over Dave's bare skin._

 _It had started as a joke, really. Someone on Twitter asking if he'd ever let Neal tattoo him, and he'd said yes without thinking about it, and then a couple of nights later there was a lot of beer (him) and vodka (Neal) and some trash-talking and maybe some double-dog-dares and a call to some guy Kira knew in the area who had a tattoo kit he was willing to sell them, and now somehow here they are. In Dave's hotel room and way past joking. Sober, fortunately—they'd agreed on that as a condition—but at the moment, that's not really as comforting as Dave wants it to be._

 _He takes a deep breath. It's not like this is his first rodeo, and Neal gets new ink to celebrate days that end in "y," all the time grinning that cheerful grin like he's eating ice cream or something, so he's probably picked up a lot of stuff by osmosis. And what the hell, Dave trusts him with every other damn thing, so why not this? "C'mon," he says, "get on with it, we got a show tomorrow," and Neal breathes deep, too, starts the needle humming, and leans in._

 _The sensation is familiar, but still sharp every time, the heat and sting and buzz. The design is Dave's: a simple black line drawing of a gun and a rose on opposite sides of his spine, just between his shoulderblades. He's not really sure why neither one of them can seem to take those necklaces off for more than the span of a shower, but he likes feeling the weight around his neck, and likes the idea that even when the inevitable day comes that the necklaces get lost or broken, he'll still have an echo of them on his skin, the traces of this crazy never-ending road trip with Neal at his side every night._

 _Neal's right thumb and forefinger are braced against Dave's back, making a tactile frame for the progress of the needle. Slow at first, careful. When Dave turns his head, he can see Neal's face reflected in the mirror on the wall, tongue caught between his teeth, total focus on the skin in front of him. Dave can feel heat in the needle's wake, and adrenaline starting to spike his nerve endings, making them hyper-sensitive to the contrasting cool of the cloth that Neal's using to wipe away the blood and extra ink. Then Neal leans in close enough that the fringe of his hair brushes Dave's back, and Dave can't help it; he shivers._

 _"Hey!" Neal sits back immediately, breaking contact. "This is hard enough without a moving target!"_

 _"Sorry," Dave says. "Just…" He trails off._ Just what? Don't touch me? Don't touch me with your hair? Don't… _He doesn't even want to finish that sentence in his own head. "Sorry," he says again, "hit it," and he bends his neck and lets his fingers curl tight into the cheap bedspread, under his legs where Neal can't see._

 _Once he's started down that road, though, it's damn near impossible to un-think it. Every sensation seems magnified: the vibration of the needle reverberating down his spine, the rush of blood under his skin, the sharp sudden spikes of pain that slide into temporary respite, the sweep of Neal's breath against his back. It feels almost like being on stage, surreality and hyper-clarity at the same time, and the knowledge that this is going to be there for the rest of his life, this thing he and Neal made together._

 _"Dave." Neal pauses again, lifting the needle away, and the rough grate of his voice shocks Dave out of his… whatever he's in. Enough for him to realize that his shoulders are heaving like he's just gone for a jog, and not only that, but Neal's breathing hard, too, inhaling and exhaling in harmony to the hum of the gun. Dave's about one-quarter tempted and three-quarters not ready to look in the mirror and see the look on Neal's face, so he just keeps his eyes on the faded green swirls on the bedspread. He feels Neal's free hand press flat against his back. "Almost finished, okay?"_

 _"'M fine," Dave says, for lack of anything more coherent to offer—it's taking everything he's got just to bring his breathing back to normal. There's a pause of several stretched-thin seconds, but it never breaks, and eventually Neal touches the gun to Dave's skin again. Having somewhere to put the adrenaline is a relief; the noise fills the vacuum of everything they're not saying._

 _Unfortunately, it only seems like a minute or two before Neal gives the raw pattern one last swipe with the cloth and then sits back, clicking the gun off. Then it's nothing but the distant swish of cars on the rainy street outside, and the inexorable tick-tick-tick of Dave's watch._

 _"Wanna see?" Neal asks finally._

 _Dave does, of course, but that would involve looking at Neal, too, and the air feels thick in his lungs. "Later. I trust you."_

 _"Yeah?" Neal says._

 _Dave does look back at him then, automatically. "Yeah. Of course." Neal's eyes are fever-bright, and as Dave watches, his tongue darts out to lick his lips. Dave's fingers are aching from his death-grip on the bedspread, and if it was anyone else… but it's not, it's Neal, and he can't afford to be wrong about this._

 _He forces himself to let go of the cloth in his hands, and stands up, grabbing his discarded shirt from the bed next to him. "Thanks," he says. "I'm gonna go get Monty to play nurse with the after-care, you know he loves that shit," because if Neal touches him again, he's not going to be responsible for his actions. "You need any help cleaning this up?"_

 _Neal blinks and shakes his head a little, like he's coming up from underwater. "No, it's cool, I got it."_

 _"Cool," Dave answers inanely, and flees the room._

 _That night, he keeps Monty up way too late playing gin rummy. Dave loses fifty bucks and his favorite pair of cufflinks, but it also gives him an excuse to crash on the couch in Monty and Kyle's room, and under the circumstances, that's more than worth the price._

 

*****

 

Dave's got a _Family Guy_ marathon going on his bunk when his phone starts buzzing against his hip. He almost ignores it—he's not sure what time it is, but he knows damn well he's off the fucking clock—but curiosity gets the better of him, so he hits pause on the TV and digs the phone out of his pocket. His stomach does a dive and roll when he sees Neal's name on the display; Neal hates the phone, and he's got no compelling reason to be calling, especially not at almost two in the morning. And Dave's had enough experience with bad news in his life that he yanks the phone to his ear as quickly as he can.

"Neal? You okay?"

"Dave. I'm good. I am awesome." Neal's voice is low and rough and intimate, like molasses rolled up with gravel, and Dave knows that slur.

He lets his head fall back to the pillow, relief tangling with exasperation. "Jesus, Tiemann. Are you seriously drunk-dialing me, you fucker? You scared the shit out of me."

"Sorry, just." There's a rustling noise, and a soft exhale. "Just wanted to hear you. Not on YouTube. The real you."

Dave really, _really_ wants to discuss the YouTube thing, but even drunk, he's not sure how long Neal would stick around for that conversation, so instead he goes with, "Are you implying that I lip-sync?"

Neal laughs, easy and sweet, like Dave hasn't made him laugh in months, and it goes right to Dave's heart like a sharp, bright blade. "No," Neal says. "No, never." Then he's quiet for a few seconds, just breathing, and Dave can't wait, he's that hungry for the sound of Neal's voice.

"Where are you?" he asks.

"Dunno. Somebody's house. Somewhere. You?"

Dave thinks about it, then chuckles a little. "Actually, I don't know either. The bus. Somewhere." He could do the math, reach for it, but he doesn't want to; the less this is tethered to reality, the better.

"Smells like socks here," Neal offers.

"Hey, same here, imagine that," Dave answers, grinning.

"Saw a Trans Am today," Neal says.

"Smokey!" Dave says automatically, and Neal laughs again. It's an old game, going back to Axium's first tour with MWK: on sight of a Trans Am, whoever says "Smokey" first gets smokes or beer at the next stop, their choice. They'd passed it along to the rest of the band on the Declaration Tour, but Dave hasn't played it since. Not a lot of Trans Ams on the road these days anyway.

"See?" Neal says. "I said it, and no one knew what I meant, and nobody bought me anything." Another familiar noise: the wet pop of Neal's mouth at the mouth of a bottle.

Dave closes his eyes. "Neal…."

"Wish you were here," Neal interrupts. "Want…" More rustling. "Wanna touch you. Wanna fuck you, Dave, wanna spread you out, hold you down…" He moans, muffled, and Dave can picture one of Neal's lip rings caught between his teeth.

Dave swallows hard. "Neal," he says again, and this time it's surrender. He lets his hand drift down his stomach, shaky but not hesitant; he's already hard, has been since the first whiskey rasp of Neal's voice. He's not thinking about the reasons why they're doing this over the phone and not in his bunk. He slips his hand underneath the waistband of his boxers and hisses when his fingers brush his cock. "Fuck, man. _Fuck._ " He grips hard, and it forces a gasp out of his mouth. "Miss you."

"Miss you too," Neal says, the words blurring. "I miss… mmm. Dave… I miss…" And then there's only breathing, and the thud of the phone hitting the floor.

Dave pulls his hand out of his shorts and squeezes his eyes shut again, hard enough to make bright dots appear behind his eyelids. God _fucking_ dammit. "Neal?" he tries, as loud as he dares. This is not a conversation he wants to have with anyone else in his band. "Doctor?"

No response.

"Asshole," Dave mutters, and he's not sure whether he's talking to Neal or to himself. He gives himself a few deep breaths to _not_ hit the wall of his bunk, then hangs up his phone and brings up his contact list instead. He finds Brandon's number—which he's had in his phone since January, but has never used—and texts, _Hey this is David Cook. Check on Tiemann and make sure he doesn't choke on anything please?_

Because he's a mature and rational adult, he also doesn't throw his phone at the wall of his bunk. Instead, he closes his eyes and wonders if when he wakes up, the whole thing will turn out to be a dream. A hot, embarrassing dream.

His phone buzzes just as he's drifting into a vague doze. _Thanks man he's good. Take care_ , Brandon has texted.

"Asshole," Dave mutters again. With vicious, deliberate pressure, he holds down the power button on his phone until it goes dark, then shoves it as far away from him as he can get it, and tries to sleep.

 

*****

 

 _Dave is alone in the green room with his ears ringing and his chest aching. It's not an entirely unfamiliar feeling—the desperate helpless_ wait-not-yet _feeling of striking the set of one of his high school plays, watching a whole carefully-crafted world disintegrate into a pile of painted flats—but it's cranked up to eleven now, up to a hundred, and he's not sure that he's ready to face whatever's waiting when the house lights come up._

 _He braces his hands on the couch in front of him and lets his head hang between his shoulders, trying to breathe. The door creaks behind him._

 _"Whoa." Neal holds up both hands when Dave whirls around. "It's just me."_

 _Dave tries to laugh. "Dammit, I thought you were the stripper I ordered."_

 _"You wish," Neal says, and blows him a kiss. He pulls the door closed behind him as he takes another step into the room._

 _"Lock it, will ya?" Dave says before he can think about it._

 _Neal raises an eyebrow._

 _"Just." Dave waves a hand aimlessly in front of him. "I just need a minute, you know?"_

 _Neal looks like he's considering giving Dave more shit about that, but then he just says, "Sure, okay," and turns back to the door._

 _Something about the click of the lock makes the air in the room feel suddenly charged; Dave half-expects to see it pinging off his skin in tiny sparks. It's been like this every time he's been alone with Neal since that night in the hotel with the tattoo gun, but—fortunately or unfortunately, Dave hasn't been able to decide which—living on a bus with eight other guys tends to make alone time pretty scarce._

 _Until now._

 _"So," Neal says when he's facing Dave again. "Last show."_

 _Dave nods. "Yep. Last show." He hopes Neal can't hear the edge of hysteria in his laugh, but he's pretty sure that's a vain hope. Neal knows him way too well. "Did I say thank you?"_

 _"Pretty much every five minutes for the past two weeks," Neal answers with a barely-straight face. "TC wants to make a drinking game out of it."_

 _Dave snorts and drops his chin to his chest. "Fuck you guys, I take it back. I take it all back. You're all fired." Only he can't fire TC anymore, because the tour is over, so TC is going to be some other band's sound guy now, and Dave's going to go back to his half-furnished house in L.A. and do… something, and Jesus, he can't breathe._

 _"Hey," Neal says, moving close. He's got his hands in his pockets, but they're curled into fists, standing out oddly against his thighs. "Are you freaking out?"_

 _It makes Dave laugh again, and just enough of the tension goes with it that he can take a deep breath and look Neal in the eye. "I couldn't have done this without you," he says, expecting a_ damn right _in return._

 _But there's no hint of a smile on Neal's face this time. "Bullshit," he says quietly, with enough intensity to send a shiver skipping down Dave's spine. "You got here, you earned this."_

 _Dave blinks; they're off the script now, and he's not sure where this goes. He feels raw, cracked open, like as soon as he moves or breathes or even thinks anything, all the heat and hunger is just going to come pouring out of him. Neal's eyes are burning blue in the light from the old lamp in the corner, and the muscles of his shoulders are tense underneath the clean line of his shirt. He's still got his tie on, but it's loose, exposing the beads and the gun around his neck._

 _Dave's mouth waters, which doesn't seem possible when his throat is so dry. He swallows. "Okay," he says, and then, with his heart hammering against his ribs, "I didn't_ want _to do it without you."_

 _Neal nods. "Good." He takes the last step between them and runs his hands up the slick material of Dave's vest. "I didn't want you to," he says, then curls his fingers into the satin and pulls until Dave's mouth collides with his._

 _It should be strange, kissing Neal, but after the first brief mindless thrill of shock, it's like plugging in to an amp; Dave's whole body is thrumming with it, the electric buzz hovering just above his skin. He opens his mouth wider, and Neal takes advantage immediately, his tongue sweeping into Dave's mouth, snakebites warm as they press indentations into Dave's bottom lip. Dave makes an incoherent noise and wraps both hands around the sides of Neal's head, sinking his fingers into Neal's hair and pulling him closer still, wanting more, harder,_ more _._

 _Neal growls,_ "Fuck," _into Dave's mouth, and starts pushing him backward, back back back until the heels of his boots hit the wall. Neal crowds in anyway, trapping Dave with the solid bulk of him, rocking his hips against Dave's and making them both groan, two-part harmony._

 _They should probably talk about this, Dave knows, but for once in his life he doesn't feel like talking, just wants the heat of Neal's body and the uneven rhythm of his gasps, drowning out everything else in Dave's head. He shoves Neal back, breaking the kiss, and Neal's eyes are glazed and unfocused and, at the moment, wide with confusion._

 _"No—" Dave says, and then, as the confusion spreads, "I mean,_ yes _, just—fuck," and he grabs Neal's belt-loops and uses them as leverage to switch their positions. He slides to his knees, dragging his hands along Neal's thighs as he goes._

 _Neal's head thunks back against the wall and Dave hears him moan, "Mother_ fuck _" at the ceiling. Dave laughs and pops the button on Neal's skin-tight jeans._

 _The button's the easy part; getting them down over Neal's hips is a little more of a challenge. "Christ, why don't you just wear a chastity belt?" Dave complains._

 _"You're the worst groupie ever," Neal informs him breathlessly, angling his hips forward to help._

 _Dave yanks harder. "Hey, if this isn't up to your standards, I could stop, y'know." Which is a gigantic lie, especially now that he's tugged the jeans down far enough that Neal's cock is just inches from Dave's mouth. He's always been pretty sure that Neal goes commando under his show jeans, but having the evidence right in front of him is enough to send his own hard-on from "insistent" to "painful"; he presses the heel of his hand down against his crotch to ease the ache._

 _Neal reaches out with unsteady fingers and grabs hold of Dave's dangling tie, wrapping it once around his hand. "Don't you fucking dare stop," he grits out, and pulls, just enough to drag Dave forward a couple of centimeters._

 _Dave's cock pulses under his fingers, and it suddenly becomes crystal clear to him why he's always liked—_ really _liked, to a mildly embarrassing or at least inconvenient degree—watching Neal direct their setup in a new venue. He looks up at Neal, wanting him to see, too, and Neal's fingers tighten convulsively as his hips stutter forward, his cock nudging against Dave's lips._

 _Dave hums and opens his mouth._

 _He's done this before, more than a few times; his voice and his guitar have given him some options over the years, and Dave's an open-minded kind of guy. So he's not exactly a rookie, but this is a whole new ballgame: this is_ Neal's _cock filling his mouth, hard and smooth and so fucking hot,_ Neal's _voice murmuring filthy encouragement—_ "Oh fuck yeah, suck it, fucking Christ, Dave, your mouth, fucking love your mouth" _—and the weirdest thing about it is how weird it's not, after all this time. Dave's suddenly wondering how he made it a year in a mobile pressure-cooker without ever ending up like this._

 _He's determined to make the most of the opportunity now, anyway, so he uses every trick he knows: hollows his cheeks and rubs his tongue along the underside of Neal's dick, brings his hand up to palm Neal's balls, listens as hard as he can over the sound of his own moans to catch each hitch in Neal's breath, each muttered curse and compliment. Neal's hips are starting to move, small thrusts into Dave's mouth, and Dave can feel the tension in Neal's thighs, the effort it's taking to keep him from just letting go and fucking Dave's face. He takes that as a compliment, too, and he's about to pull off long enough to tell Neal he can do whatever he wants—fuck it, Dave doesn't have to sing tomorrow, or maybe ever again, maybe he'll just give up his career and suck Neal's cock for the rest of his life, at the moment that sounds like a completely viable plan—when Neal curls his hand tighter into Dave's tie._

 _"Fuck, Dave, yeah, fuck, like that, gonna—" and he loosens his grip on the tie at the last second, enough to give Dave the option. But Dave's been waiting for this, he's sure as hell not going to miss the last act, so he makes a hungry, wordless noise and stays exactly where he is while Neal tenses and gasps his name again and then comes in Dave's mouth._

 _Dave stays with him through the aftershocks, milking him for every last drop; Neal slumps back against the wall and braces a hand on Dave's shoulder to hold himself upright. When Dave does pull off, it's mainly so that he can hide a satisfied grin in Neal's thigh. He just made Neal Tiemann come, made him come so hard that he can barely stand up, and he doesn't need a panel of judges to tell him that he should be inordinately pleased with himself._

 _"Pretty fucking pleased with yourself, aren't you?" Neal asks, still breathless; Dave has a second to reflect on how freaky it can be to have sex with someone who knows you incredibly well, and then Neal hauls him up by his tie. Dave stands awkwardly, his knees stiff from the cold floor. Neal nudges him sideways until he's got his back to the wall again, Neal's body pressed up furnace-hot all against his side._

 _"So fucking hot," Neal mutters, yanking at the button on Dave's fly. His voice is fucked-out, shot through with a sandpaper edge. "You on your knees, with that cocksucking mouth,_ fuck _, so hot." Then he's stroking Dave's dick through his boxers, and even through the cloth, it's instantly addictive; Dave whines and shoves his hips forward, drawing a pleased, dark chuckle out of Neal. Who proceeds to take his hand away, what the_ fuck _, but only for a second, just long enough to spit into it. Dave tips his head back and moans with anticipation._

 _"Please, Neal, please—"_

 _Neal scrapes his stubble along the side of Dave's cheek, gently, just enough sensation to bridge the gap. "I got you." And then he does, spit-slick fingers on Dave's naked cock, and oh, Christ, Dave's not gonna survive this._

 _What a way to go, though, with Neal jacking him perfectly, quick and steady and hard. "I know what you like," Neal tells him, and the words seem to drag slow down his body, like the echo of Neal's beard against his cheek. "I hear you in your bunk, Dave, hear the sounds you make, drives me crazy. You drive me crazy. Watching you out there onstage, so bright, they all wanna fuck you, want to be near you, want you on your knees and under their hands and just—like—this—" He twists his hand just right on the last few words, and Dave can't take it anymore; his orgasm feels like it comes right up from his toes, sparking every nerve ending in a single brilliant wave that leaves him drained and panting against the sweaty skin of Neal's neck._

 _It seems like a pretty good place to stay for a while, a little warm cocoon that smells and tastes like Neal and sex and home, with Neal's heart thumping away against Dave's shoulder. Neal moves his hand after a minute, just enough to wipe it on Dave's shirttail; the thought drifts by that the band is going to be looking for them at some point, and that come is going to be extremely difficult to hide on black shirts and black jeans. Dave just sighs and presses closer to Neal. He'll cross that bridge when he gets to it, he feels too good to worry about anything now._

 _"Not that you have any evidence of this, but I swear I can usually hold out longer than that," he mumbles finally. As he talks, his lips catch on something smooth and round—Neal's necklace. That feels appropriate, somehow._

 _"Longer?" Neal's voice is an amused rumble against Dave's forehead. "Fuck you, I've been waiting for this for eight fucking years, that's about as long as I can stand."_

 _"Oh," Dave says, because he's only recently realized how long_ he's _wanted this, and… oh. In his mind, he gets a quick flipbook flashback of all the late-night conversations, all the inside jokes, all the overexposed moments under the lights when they've pushed into each other's space and just breathed there. "Oh," he says again. "Shit." He drags his head up with some effort, to meet Neal's eyes. "What the hell have we been doing all this time?"_

 _Neal smiles at him, and it's one Dave hasn't ever quite seen before: it's as bright as ever, but softer somehow, like a fire in a dark room. Up close like this, it's pretty devastating. "Well," Neal says. "I don't actually_ just _hang around on the hope of getting in your pants, y'know. There are a few other advantages."_

 _Dave gives that some thought while his stomach does a slow, happy flip in his abdomen. "I think," he says finally, "that I'm both touched and insulted."_

 _Neal's smile widens. "Awesome. And," he goes on, one finger slipping underneath Dave's shirt to rub at the skin of his hip, "Seeing as we don’t have to be anywhere for approximately the next… ever, if you wanted to start making up for all that time…."_

 _Dave grins and yanks him in._

 

*****

 

In the light of day, the more Dave thinks about the whole drunk-dialing thing, the more pissed off he gets: at Neal, for only calling when he's wasted and horny and lonely, and at himself, for the way his careful veneer of indifference had cracked like cheap plastic at the first sign of Neal being wasted and horny and lonely. So when his phone rings and he sees Neal's name on the display again, he ignores it.

He ignores it six times, in fact, six different times throughout a long travel day. He starts feeling guilty right around the third time, at which point he remembers the night before and gets an answering wave of embarrassment and anger that swamps the guilt easily. When they're pulled over at a truck stop for dinner, he finds himself leaning against the side of the bus and running through the Chiefs' entire o-line in his head, just to get his brain to shut up for a while.

Monty comes sauntering up. "Phone's for you," he says, offering his. Dave takes it without thinking, expecting Andrew, maybe, or someone from the label or Gavin's crew.

"Hello?"

"Ignoring my calls? What are you, twelve?" comes Neal's voice down the line.

Dave takes a moment to flip Monty off, which has absolutely zero effect, unless he counts a long-suffering eye-roll before Monty abandons him. "What are you, drunk? Again?" he retorts to Neal. He tries to make it sound joking about halfway through, but it's a feeble effort and he knows it.

"Not yet, but I might be later, do you want me to update you, Mom?" Neal snaps, like it's a reflex, and then immediately makes frustrated noise and rushes on, "Look, I'm sorry, okay?"

Dave narrows his eyes, even though Neal can't see him. "For what?"

"For passing out on you last night; Brandon said you were worried." Neal says. "I was hammered, I shouldn't have—"

But Dave can't take it. " _That's_ what you're apologizing for? For _last night_?" His voice is maybe a little louder than it should be, but it feels like a volcano is starting to erupt in his chest, cracks spewing steam and roiling with everything he's been trying to keep locked down for days and days and weeks and months and he can't do it anymore, he can't. He walks away from the bus, back toward the shelter of shadows and road noise at the corner of the parking lot.

"What else should I apologize for?" Neal asks, dangerously low.

"I needed you!" Dave bursts out. "I've had the hardest fucking year of my life, and I needed you, and you _left_ , and don't fucking pretend you don't know what I'm talking about."

"Hey, I fucking moved across the country for you," Neal fires back. "I played at goddamn _Disneyland_. I put my band on hold, I left Burn Halo, I went to all those bullshit meetings and played nice and kept my mouth shut and I never fucking complained, because I thought you needed me."

Dave stumbles back under the onslaught. "Wow, I didn't realize you were keeping score. I guess I thought you were doing some of those things for _your_ career, but apparently you were just sacrificing for me, so sure, I'm the asshole."

"What about what _I_ need?" Neal demands. "I know it's all about you, all the time, Heartthrob—" and it hurts, the nickname turned against him like that—"but sometimes other people need things, too. Like I need you to fucking understand why I need to do this, why this is important to me, instead of taking it as a personal insult when it has nothing to do with you."

"My lead guitarist and musical director and…" Dave stutters to a stop, because he doesn't have a word that covers everything Neal is to him, then regroups, "You leave my band right before a tour, and it doesn't have anything to do with me?"

"So kind of like how when you fucked off and left for American fucking Idol, it affected me and Andy and Josh? I don’t recall you asking our permission for that."

Dave's jaw drops. "I didn't plan any of that shit and you know it, and you were in New York already; it's not like I ditched you in the middle of a gig."

Neal makes an exasperated growling noise. "All right, fine. You shouldn't have asked for our permission. You went after what was important to you, which is exactly what you should have done."

"Oh, that's convenient," Dave sneers. "And was it important to you to fall off the face of the earth and not even fucking send me a text message until you wanted something? Was that part of this great new vision you're following?"

"What was I gonna say, Dave? All you wanted to hear was that I was coming back, and I can't tell you that."

"Yeah, you've made that pretty clear," Dave snaps, and Neal's right about one thing: it may not be news, but it sucks to hear it again. "But how the fuck do you know what I wanted to hear? Maybe I just wanted to hear something from you at all. You left the band, and I don't get a say in that, but you were my best friend, man. I thought at least we were still friends. I can't—" _Can't handle losing anyone else_ , he almost says, but clamps his mouth shut on the words just in time. Even unspoken, they hit him like a punch in the gut, and his heart pounds against the pressure in his chest; he's dizzy. Grief is an unpredictable bastard, rising up to sink its teeth into him when he least expects it. And he knows he can't lay that at Neal's door, but the ache and fear is there anyway, the panicked urge to tether himself tight to everything and everyone he's got left.

"Of course we're still friends," Neal says finally, into the silence. He sounds tired, and Dave is so damn tired of making his friends tired.

"Look," he says, rubbing a hand across his burning eyes. "Let's just… put this on pause for a while, okay?"

"What does that mean?" Neal asks.

"It means…" Dave makes himself think it through first, to say it right; he owes Neal that. "It means that I don't know how to be okay with this, and I think it's better not to say anything at all for a while than to say something I'll regret."

"Dave," Neal says, "I don't want—"

"Just for a while," Dave says. "Please. Okay?"

There's another long, heavy silence, and then Neal just says, "Fine," and hangs up.

Dave sags back against the spindly tree behind him, braces a hand on each of his knees and tries to breathe, because it's either that or throw up. He hates this; hates the way his world keeps shifting beyond his control, and hates that he holds on so hard that he ends up getting shredded right along with it. _Paper heart_ , he thinks bitterly; it's never felt more true.

The bus engine starts, and Dave forces one foot in front of the other until he sees the steps in front of him.

"How'd it…" Monty starts as Dave gets to the top of the stairs, but trails off almost immediately. Dave doesn't look at Monty's face, just grabs his shoulder briefly as he makes his way back to the bunks. He rolls into his bed and pulls the curtain closed.

 

*****

 

 _"Okay, seriously, dude, I think you're starting to mold," says Neal's voice, cutting through Dave's cocoon of blankets._

 _"Mmph," Dave replies. He doesn't move his head from where it's mashed into his pillow. "It's called a vacation, Tiemann. You should look into it. And anyway, I thought you liked zombies."_

 _Neal snorts. "Not to live with. History has taught us that zombies make really shitty housemates."_

 _"Yeah, whose history is that?" Dave asks, more to keep Neal talking than anything else. Sure, he's barely gotten out of bed for days, but it's not because he wants to be alone; it's just that the latter is a necessary consequence of the former._

 _"George Romero," Neal says, in a tone that's somehow both deeply offended and utterly resigned. "Among others." The mattress moves a few seconds later, and either Neal's nudging it with his leg or they're having an incredibly localized earthquake. "Cook. Come on. Get up."_

 _There's more edge to it this time, enough to make Dave feel like a jerk for worrying him, so he rolls to the side until he can meet Neal's eyes. "I'm fine, man. I'm just tired."_

 _Neal raises an eyebrow. Dave doesn't look away, trusting Neal to read the stop sign in his expression. Neal of all people should understand the desire to not talk about something, even when it's coming from what Dave can admit is a pretty unlikely source._

 _Eventually, Neal's shoulders slump. He turns away, and Dave's heart is halfway through a slump of its own when he realizes that Neal's not leaving—he's just going to get his guitar, which is cradled in one of the half-dozen guitar stands scattered around Dave's room._

 _"Move over," Neal says. Dave slides sideways, and Neal settles himself on the bed, back against the headboard, one knee cocked up to support the curve of the guitar. He strums a few chords, tuning; Dave can feel the heat of Neal's hip, the vibration of each chord as it hums through the air and through Neal's body. He lets his eyes drift shut and imagines the sound waves breaking over him, warm and smooth. He shifts closer, until his forearm is pressed against Neal's thigh._

 _Neal noodles around for a while, weaving from one classical-sounding piece to another, and then, just as Dave is starting to feel the tug of familiarity at the edges of his brain, Neal starts to sing quietly. "Forward on, we march with solace, knowing that we'll never be alone…."_

 _It's like going from drifting along a lazy river to being dunked into deep water; the combination of the words themselves and the fact that Neal's singing, voluntarily—that Neal trusts him with this performance for an audience of one—breaks through Dave's hard-won surface tension and has his eyes welling up before he can stop them. He digs his fingers into the loose denim at Neal's thigh and hangs on, squeezing his eyes tighter against the hot rush of tears._

 _The song ends, and Neal lets the last notes fade into silence. Dave's face is wet, the sheets clinging damply to his cheek. When he looks up, Neal's watching him, a crease between his eyebrows, his jaw clenched hard._

 _Dave clears his throat and wipes his face against the sheet. "Sorry."_

 _"Don't be sorry," Neal says before Dave can even finish the word. He takes his hand off the strings and drops it down to rest on the side of Dave's neck, his thumb edging underneath the collar of Dave's t-shirt. "I just wish I could help."_

 _"You are helping," Dave says, and he means it. He's been trying to keep it together at least a little bit when Andrew's around—he's got two big brothers'-worth of responsibility now—but Andrew's been busy job-hunting, and so Neal's ended up with the short end of this stick, thinking he was hooking up with one of his best friends and getting a hibernating, occasionally pissy zombie instead. All things considered, Dave's grateful Neal hasn't kicked his mopey ass to the curb yet. He gives Neal a rueful half-smile. "It just turns out that repressing really horrible shit doesn't actually make it go away. Who knew?"_

 _"Mmm," Neal answers, with a sideways smile of his own. "I have no idea what you're talking about."_

 _Dave runs one finger along the side seam of Neal's jeans. "You're helping," he says again. "You just can't fix it."_

 _Neal sighs heavily. "I know." His hand curls briefly into a fist, then slides underneath Dave's collar, fingers splayed warm against the bare skin of Dave's back, spread wide like he's looking for maximum contact._

 _"You could play some more, though," Dave says after a minute, because if Neal keeps touching him, he's going to start full-out sobbing into his pillow, and he's pretty sure they've both had enough of that._

 _"Yeah?" Neal says. He takes his hand off Dave's back, and Dave bites back an involuntary protest, even though it was exactly what he'd planned for._

 _"Yeah," he answers instead. And because he's not quite ready to give up on the whole avoidance thing, he pitches his voice soft and high and asks, "Do you know any Enya? Because I just find that so soothing."_

 _Neal snickers, but puts his fingers to the strings and, after some thought, starts to pick out a decent facsimile of "Caribbean Blue."_

 _Dave shoves his face into the sheets with a groan that's more than half laugh. "Oh, god. You are losing so much cred right now."_

 _"Fuck you, I'd like to see you play these arpeggios," Neal says, forehead creased with concentration. Then he misses a note, tries again, mutters, "Fuck," and switches to "Smoke On the Water."_

 _"Points for the nautical theme," Dave tells him; when Neal gets to the chorus, Dave inhales to start singing._

 

*****

 

There's a period of weeks where Dave knows that he's being—not to put too fine a point on it—a total dick. Not outwardly, or at least not much; he laughs with his band, he flirts with the fans at meet-and-greets, he pours his soul out into the microphone every night, which he's pretty sure is the only thing keeping him sane, at the end of the day. Non-show days are the ones when he's likelier to bite Kyle's head off for keeping him awake, or glare at a tech for messing with his setup; all that tension knotted up with nowhere to go, it ends up snapping out like a broken rubber band, and he ends up doing more than his usual share of apologizing. But mostly he keeps it together, on the outside.

He makes up for it, though, by being a complete asshole on the inside. Number one on his list of Secret Asshole Moments is when Andy and Jennie get engaged, and he's genuinely thrilled for them, of course, but it's all twined up with jealousy so acrid that he has to suck champagne through gritted teeth after toasting the happy couple. But there are smaller things, too: he takes Neal off text alerts but stalks his Twitter like a crazed fan, looking for any signs of misery; he gets nervous anytime anyone in his band or crew spends too much time with anyone else's band or crew; when the MWK EP is released, a part of him hates Andy and Kyle and even Joey for still having what he can't.

 _Just call him, dumbass_ , Kira texts him and Neal simultaneously, followed by several other increasingly profane variations on that theme. Andrew emails him a picture of a stick figure wearing a dunce cap, which he has helpfully labeled _David_. Monty doesn't say much with his mouth, but his eyebrows speak volumes. Andy says nothing at all, because Andy is Switzerland, and Dave understands that; he's grateful for it, actually, seeing as everyone else is so full of (admittedly good-natured) advice.

"For what it's worth," Kyle says to him one afternoon, when Dave happens to walk up behind him as he's watching a YouTube clip of Neal and Joey Bradford, beers in hand, laughing at an interviewer somewhere in the desert. "He wouldn't have left unless this was really important to him."

"Honestly?" Dave says—quietly, because he's tired, and Neal looks happy, and Hell or Highwater could've been Kyle's band, too, if he'd wanted it to be—"I get that. I really do. But just because he had a good reason for it doesn't make it suck any less."

Kyle doesn't seem to have an answer for that.

 

*****

 

 _Rationally, Dave knows that water is going to be the best thing for his splitting headache. But he's staring into the refrigerator anyway, trying to resist the riesling that's singing sweetly to him from the top shelf._

 _"How'd it go?" Neal asks, coming into the kitchen. He gets one look at Dave's face and winces. "That good, huh?"_

 _Dave sighs and closes the refrigerator. He's not twenty years old anymore—at the moment, he feels more like a hundred—so he grabs a glass out of the cupboard and starts filling it with water from the tap. "I feel like I just went five rounds with Triple H."_

 _"Five rounds with RCA is worse," Neal points out. "Did you get what you wanted?"_

 _"I don't know. Mostly." Dave turns to find Neal standing next to him, three Advil in his outstretched palm. "Oh my god, I could blow you right now," Dave says fervently._

 _Neal snickers. "Later. I expect your full attention when you do."_

 _"Demanding," Dave mumbles around the Advil he's already popped in his mouth. He takes a few long swallows of water, closing his eyes at the relief on his raw throat. He sags back against the counter._

 _Neal settles next to him. "So let's hear it," he says, in his Musical Director tone._

 _Now that the fog is lifting a bit, Dave abruptly remembers that he might not actually want to discuss this with Neal at the moment; he gulps more water, stalling. Ordinarily he loves talking to Neal about this kind of thing—in fact, he'd bring Neal to every meeting if he could. The label, though, is adamant that since he's actually in town this time around instead of off singing "Please Don't Stop the Music" until he wants to stab himself in the eardrum just to stop the fucking music, Neal's no longer an acceptable surrogate. But in this particular case, he's not anxious to get into details, and Neal being all solicitous and sympathetic is just making it worse._

 _"Aw, shit," Neal says, looking at him closely. "What did they make you take out? 'Circadian'? 'Time Marches On'?"_

 _Dave swallows the last of his water. "No, no. Those are in. 'Goodbye To the Girl,' too." Because apparently songs about suicide are okay as long as they're also songs about bad breakups. Eyes fixed on his empty glass—which is morbidly appropriate right about now—he admits, "It was 'With Me Empty.'" As soon as it's out, he forces himself to meet Neal's eyes. "I tried, man, I swear—I argued for like an hour, but they wouldn't go for it. Isn't radio-friendly, not the sound people expect from me, blah blah blah, you know the drill."_

 _Neal slams a hand down on the counter. "God_ dammit _. Fucking corporate assholes."_

 _"You can save it for MWK now," Dave says quickly, which was the best silver lining he could come up with on the way home._

 _"It's not about that," Neal says, shoving away to pace toward the center of the kitchen._

 _"Look, I'll make it up to you for the royalties—" Dave starts._

 _Neal rounds on him. "It's not about the fucking royalties either, and fuck you for suggesting that it is!" he snaps._

 _Hammers are starting to pound on the insides of Dave's temples again. "I don't know what you want from me, I fucking_ tried _, okay? It was important to me, too!" The memory is still vivid in his mind: three days straight in his basement studio with Neal and Andy, with a hell of a lot more beer and pizza than sleep or showering, high on creating something new and different with two of the people he loved most in the world. He's written dozens of songs with them over the past decade, including the one that's going to make the record after all, but nothing has ever felt quite like that, like they were carving out a new path together. Even writing with Raine again had seemed like kind of a letdown after that. So he'd_ wanted _it on the album, both for what it was and for how they'd gotten there, and he'd argued his throat sore fighting for it._

 _"That's exactly what sucks about it, that it_ was _important to you, and they don't give a shit," Neal is saying. "Jesus, I don't know how you put up with this bullshit."_

 _And there it is. It's been simmering beneath the surface since they started writing for the album—maybe even since they were working on the first album—and after having it hanging over their heads for so long, it's a relief to finally have it out in the open. And Dave has had the same argument with himself often enough that his answer is as ready as anything he ever prepped for forensics._

 _"I paid off my mom's mortgage," he says, ticking the list off on his fingers as he goes. "Andrew can come out of a college halfway across the country and intern here, doing something he loves, and it doesn't matter that he's getting paid fifty cents an hour. I get to play with you guys without any of us having to choose between buying food and paying rent. I get to talk about brain cancer research or schoolkids in Ethiopia and people actually listen, actually donate their money. And I get to play music for a living and not have to worry about whether tomorrow I'm going to be back bussing tables." He shrugs, arms spread wide. "I will take that, bullshit and all."_

 _While Dave's been talking, Neal's expression has been gradually downshifting from furious to somewhere closer to frustrated, but he's still got that stubborn set to his mouth. "But you're a_ commodity _to these people. Like a fucking sports car. They don’t give a shit about you, or about music—all they care about is dollar signs."_

 _Dave forgets, sometimes, that Neal didn't go through the whole Idol experience, didn't have to struggle to find something genuine in Coke commercials, or get trotted out like a prize show dog at every random FOX event for exactly one year until it was time to turn the leash and collar over to a new guy with a guitar. Ever since Seacrest had said his name instead of Archie's, Dave's been in the maze, and his choices are either to keep moving forward or get lost in it. He sighs and scrubs both hands over his face. "I don't give a shit about them, either, okay, we're… we're mutual parasites." A crossword-puzzle word pops into his head, and he can't resist. "It's a symbiotic relationship, right?"_

 _Neal just stares at him, until a smile finally cracks through and he looks up at the ceiling, clearly annoyed at himself for breaking. "Fuck, you're a nerd."_

 _Later, Dave is going to point out that Neal could probably name half a dozen Star Trek episodes revolving around the concept of symbiosis, but for now, he just chuckles and moves closer, pressing his advantage. "We can still sing it live, at least. The live shows are_ ours _, Doctor."_

 _Neal rolls his eyes. "Yeah. As long as we don't swear, make inappropriate gestures, call people out for being assholes…."_

 _"Hey. You lick your guitar whenever you feel like it, MickDeth, and I can swear all I want to in Canada."_

 _"Home of the free," Neal says dryly._

 _"C'mon," Dave wheedles. "You're a cowboy, on a steel horse you ride…"_

 _"Not helping," Neal answers, but he's not even trying to hide his smile at this point, and Dave hooks his fingers in Neal's hip pocket to tug him in for a kiss._

 _They're okay, he thinks. For now._

 

*****

 

After a while, it starts to penetrate that carrying around a huge ball of bitterness in his stomach all the time isn't actually making Dave feel any better, and that the drama of being the wronged party is pretty cold comfort, all things considered. Neal is still gone, regardless of how petty and pissed off Dave is about it. Dave's also discovering that not talking to Neal and _not speaking_ to Neal are two entirely different things; there's a brick wall now where there used to be just a frustrating amount of open space, and he feels like he ripped off a scab and now he's bleeding again, slow and steady.

He keeps stumbling forward, though, because he's not really sure what else to do, and the tour goes on, because that's what tours do. They're winding down the U.S. leg, prepping for Europe, and Dave's excited, but he's nervous as hell, too, which is a welcome distraction. One night, on the tail end of a marathon Campfire session, Andy gets a call from Neal about MWK distribution and disappears back into the bunks, leaving Dave and Devin alone at the paper-strewn table.

It's dark, rain splattering against the side windows as they rumble on through the night, and Dave lets his mind drift and the silence spread. One of the great things about living in an enclosed space with a bunch of other people is that silence is inevitable, so they all have to get comfortable with it pretty quickly. Devin's been good at silence from the beginning, anyway, just as good as he is at snarky commentary and Jimmy Page riffs and fan interactions; Dave envies his ability to adapt himself to any situation, to expand or contract as required without ever losing his center.

"Can I give you some advice?" Devin asks suddenly.

Dave drags himself out of his haze. "Sure."

Devin takes a sip of whatever's in his water bottle—sometimes it's water, sometimes it's fruit punch, sometimes it's Scotch, like he's got a tiny bartender hidden away in there somehow. "I know this isn't really any of my business," he says, "but I've been through this a few times, and here are your options, as far as I can tell: you get to have him as a friend but not as a bandmate, or you don't get to have him as either."

Dave blinks. Since San Diego, Devin has steered clear of the whole Neal Situation, aside from tweeting him about alcohol and guitars, which—beneath his irrational jealousy—Dave finds endearing in a mildly fucked-up kind of way, like when two of his ex-girlfriends had become roommates in college. But Dave had filed this away as something they were never going to talk about, the tattooed and pierced elephant in the room, and he was fine with that.

The thing is, though, when Devin puts it like that... "Huh," Dave says, on a huff of surprise. "That's… actually a really good point."

"Of course it's a good point, I've got nothing but good points," Devin answers airily. "Gimme a topic, I will give you a good fucking point about it."

Dave snickers. "Noted." He's rolling it around in his mind, checking all the angles. It's like one of those puzzles with the interlocking metal shapes, where you can twist them and turn them and stomp on them for hours and get nowhere, and then someone else comes along and moves them half a centimeter and they just pop open, like it's nothing. "Jesus, I'm an idiot," he mutters.

"Nah," Devin says, with nothing but affection in his tone. "Like I said, man, I've been there. Anyway." He raps a knuckle down on the paper in front of him. "This is a killer setlist."

"Of course it is," Dave mimics, and Devin laughs. They sit there smiling at each other for a minute, snapshots in the glare of passing headlights, and it occurs to Dave that it's a gesture of trust, Devin being willing to wade into this whole mess just like anyone else in the band. Warmth floods his chest; he's been lucky enough to be aware of it before, that precise moment when friendship tips into family, but it never gets old.

Devin winks at him, then takes another long drink from his water bottle and gets up to leave.

"Hey, D," Dave calls after him when he's almost at the partition. Devin pauses, swaying slightly from the motion of the bus, and maybe also from whatever his tiny bartender is serving up to him tonight.

"What?" he says. "Are you in the market for some more wisdom? Because you should probably think about rationing that shit, you know, let yourself build up some tolerance."

Dave grins. "I don't know that I've said this enough, but. I'm really glad you're here."

Devin's wide, pleased smile blooms too quickly to be anything but involuntary. "Thanks, man, me too," he says, ducking his head, and disappears into the back of the bus.

The next morning, Dave corners Andy in the kitchenette, before he's even finished pouring a cup of coffee.

"Andy P," he says. He's doing his best to respect Andy's pre-caffeinated state, but he can't do anything to stop the adrenaline jittering through his veins. It feels like he's been treading water for months, and now he's itching to claw his way to somewhere new, even if he's not quite sure what's waiting for him there. And something about the familiar dark tangle of Andy's bed-head hits Dave right in the heart, unexpectedly.

"Thank you for being here," he tells Andy, though it's not actually what he stalked him here to say. "No pressure or anything, but. There are no friends like old friends, and so for however long it lasts… thanks for being here."

Andy narrows bleary eyes at him. "Did you even sleep last night?" And then, without waiting for Dave to answer, "Can you go sleep now? And come back in like an hour? Or three?"

Dave gives Andy his most charming smile, but he cracks up partway into it—Andy's basically immune at this point. Dave holds out a page of guitar tabs anyway. "Check this for me, will ya? I want to add something to the setlist."

 

*****

 

 _Neal's bags are packed and ready by the door; Kyle is due to pick him up any minute now. Dave watches him pace, the mental checklist almost visible in the air in front of him, and it's_ bizarre _, seeing Neal go through the pre-tour jitters without sharing them, himself._

 _"You've got everything. You checked five times," Dave tells him. "And if you forgot anything, I'll get it to you."_

 _Neal drags in a deep breath, then lets it out. "Okay. You're right. Okay."_

 _Aiming for distraction, Dave backs him up against the door and kisses him, lots of tongue and more than a little teeth. "Don't forget to come back," he murmurs. He's joking, mostly, but there's something gnawing at a dark corner of his heart, the fear he's had ever since the end of the Declaration Tour, that someone else is going to make Neal an offer he can't refuse._ It's only a month, _he reminds himself; it's good for Neal to get out on the road, as long as the label is taking their sweet time with Dave's album anyway._

 _"Who are you, again?" Neal asks, grinning at him fondly.  
_

 _"Dammit, my mom told me never to hook up with guys after shows…" Dave's words get swallowed as Neal kisses him this time; it’s slow and thorough and Dave can feel his bones going gooey. Goddamn, he's a sucker for Neal._

 _He wishes he could translate that into some actual sucking, but he just did that about half an hour ago, and anyway, Kyle's going to be there soon. Instead, he presses his forehead to Neal's and starts the traditional chant: "I'm gonna rise up, gonna kick a little ass, gonna kick some ass in the USA…"_

 _Neal barks out a surprised, tension-breaking laugh, and joins in almost immediately; they're both shouting by the end: "I'm gonna rise up, gonna kick a little ass, roooooooooock, flaaaaaaaaag, and eeeeeeeeeeagle!"_

 __"Yes!" _Dave yells, making touchdown arms, and right on cue, there's a honk from outside._

 _Still laughing, Neal high-fives one of Dave's outstretched hands, then reaches down to grab his bag._

 _Dave slaps him on the ass. "Go get 'em, tiger."_

 _Neal straightens, a dead-eyed expression fixed over his face. "I'll be back," he says, in his best Ah-nold impression._

 _Dave laughs and ignores the slight chill of doubt. "You'd better be."_

 

*****

 

It's their last U.S. show for a while, so Dave gives the audience everything he's got and then some. He talks almost as much as he sings, he mocks Kyle, he throws in some last-minute Zeppelin for Devin, he passes Monty a phone number from a blushing girl, and when it's time for the final song of the encore, he winks at Andy and grips the mic with both hands.

"There's a song we've been doing the last few shows," he explains, to scattered cheers from the die-hards, "and people seem to be into it, so we're gonna send you home with this. Thank you guys so much for coming out tonight; it means the world to us, it really does. We think these are pretty good words to live by, and we hope that you do, too." And Dave doesn't believe in scripted banter, but the last line stays the same every time: "This one's for a friend of mine."

He steps back, sweeping a bow to Andy, who laughs as he hurries over to take the lead mic. The crowd goes nuts; Dave never gets tired of that, seeing his fans embrace Andy so enthusiastically.

He just watches through the first verse: the smiles on the fans' faces, on his band's faces, the song woven between them all, this thing they've made together. And then he comes in with harmony on the chorus, his message in a bottle, flung out into the world with hope and without expectation: "Forward on, we march with solace…."

Afterward, he comes offstage in an awkward, staggering mass of band, one arm around Kyle's neck and one around Devin's waist, while Andy plants a hand on each of Monty's shoulders and jostles along ahead of them. They're all whooping, backslapping, the shouts of the audience still ringing through the air, and when Dave sees Neal standing in the shadows of the wings, at first he thinks it's just a trick of his mind.

Then, "Look what the cat dragged in," Andy drawls, and steps forward for a hug, so Dave figures maybe he's not seeing things after all.

The rest of them—Devin included—all collect their hugs, too, along with the requisite BS-ing, and Dave just stands there until he's the only one left, heart thundering. Neal's still grinning from whatever Monty just said, and he's right there, meeting Dave's eyes, and Dave feels like if he moves an inch, his soul is going to tip right into Neal's hands.

Neal steps close and leans in, his mouth to Dave's ear. "Got your message."

Dave laughs, partially to cover his shiver, and partially because there's a huge flood of happiness in his chest suddenly, pushing at the seams of the dam. "YouTube stalker," he accuses.

"Blame Skib, he sent the link," Neal says, voice rich and warm. Dave can't make his eyes work well enough just now to look over Neal's shoulder, but he can imagine the expression on Andy's face anyway, which is probably really similar to how he looks at Amos when he's just done one of the three tricks he knows. "Also maybe I was looking," Neal admits, lower, and Dave can't take it anymore; he wraps his arms around Neal and pulls him in tight. Neal's arms band around him, too, and his chest expands and contracts, pressed against Dave's, and it's like pouring cool water on a burn, the relief so complete and instantaneous that Dave's throat closes.

He's not sure how long they stand there, but eventually Monty calls out, "Get a room!" and they break apart, laughing. Dave even thinks Neal's face might be red, though it's hard to tell in the dimness. And now that Dave is actually aware of anything besides Neal, he realizes that they're surrounded by activity, the techs rushing by to get done with load-out before they collapse for the night; he guesses there's a reason that soppy reunions usually happen in wide fields of flowers—it's easier to stay out of the way.

"Uh," he says. His brain is still spinning on skids.

Monty steps up. "No, seriously," he says, "get a room." He and Dave were supposed to be sharing tonight, while Devin visited a friend and Kyle and Andy reunited with their girls, but Monty presses his keycard into Neal's hand.

"Where are you gonna sleep?" Neal asks.

Monty just grins and brandishes the phone number from the girl in the audience, which makes them all laugh hard enough that Dave can skate right by the fact that he just got pimped out in front of his entire band and most of his crew.

He looks at Neal instead. "Need a place to crash?" he asks. God, he feels like a sixteen-year-old asking someone to prom.

"Well, the RV is in Louisiana," Neal says. He hitches a shoulder, clearly aiming for nonchalant, but something flashes in his eyes that Dave recognizes instantly, no matter how long it's been since he last saw it. He holds back another shiver.

"Okay," he says, knowing he's fifty miles from nonchalant but not caring, because in about ten seconds, he's going to have a high-school boner to complement his high-school flashback. He looks at the rest of the band. "Well, see you guys tomorrow?" Then he remembers that it's a special occasion and gets himself under control long enough to add, "Thank you. All of you guys. I mean it. I have the best job in the world."

"Oh my god, get _out_ of here already." Devin rolls his eyes, but he's smiling.

Dave chuckles and points a finger at Monty. "Not that I doubt your mojo, man, but if you do need to book another room, you know I'm good for it."

Monty salutes, and then shoves both Dave and Neal toward the door. Somehow Dave manages to get them in a cab and on the way to the hotel, all without paying anything more than the barest amount of attention to what he's doing.

They don't say anything—it's a short ride—but the whole way, Dave can feel Neal's presence like a physical touch, even with a foot of cheap vinyl between them. As soon as they hit the elevator at the hotel, Neal is crowding him against the side wall, hands braced on either side of Dave's shoulders. Dave's pretty sure he still smells like show, sweat and adrenaline, but Neal doesn’t seem to mind in the slightest.

"So we have some stuff we should probably talk about," Neal says, his mouth close enough that Dave can almost, _almost_ feel the cool metallic slide of his snakebites.

Dave shifts his hips, enough to bring his hard-on into contact with—oh, _god_ , he's missed that—Neal's. "We can talk later."

Neal's jaw drops. "I'm sorry, I thought you just said you wanted to talk later. Hold on, I've just gotta write this moment down for posterity…" He pats the pocket of his jeans, bringing his fingers tantalizingly near Dave's crotch.

"Fuck you," Dave breathes, fighting to keep from shoving forward into Neal's touch.

"Okay," Neal answers, "but I really, _really_ wanna fuck you first—" and just as he's leaning to close the minute space between them, the elevator dings and the doors open.

For a wild moment, Dave considers just hitting the Door Close button and riding the elevator for as long as it takes, like a traveling peep show, but then the TMZ potential kicks in and he bangs his head against the mirror behind him with a growl. "Staying on the top floor next time, dammit."

Neal smirks. "Penthouse, huh? I like your style, Heartthrob."

The nickname, and the gravel baritone of Neal's voice wrapping around it, makes heat pool in Dave's stomach; he shoves at Neal's shoulders. "Room," he grits out. They barely make it out of the elevator before the doors close again.

The hallway seems impossibly long, and when they finally do get to what Dave sincerely hopes is the right room, he fumbles the keycard. "Son of a bitch," he mutters, managing to trap it against his body before he drops it entirely.

"Dave," Neal says from behind him, and just his low, urgent tone is enough to make Dave almost drop the card again.

"Fuck, I know, just—" He hits the handle and it opens, _finally_ , and then they're in the room and Neal has him up against the door, using their combined weight to slam it shut as he seals his mouth to Dave's.

All of Dave's senses are on overload, the rush from the show spiraling right into the rush of Neal's tongue in his mouth, Neal's hands on him everywhere, hungry, proprietary. Neal makes a noise that's half-moan and half-growl, and the sound goes straight to Dave's cock. He manages to work his hands up between them, fumbling at the buttons on Neal's shirt. Neal grabs his wrists, and in Dave's experience, that tends to lead to really good things with Neal, but this time, Neal just holds on and pulls back.

"Wait, wait, wait," he pants. "One thing first. Well, two."

"Are you gonna tell me you're a virgin?" Dave asks, because he's never one to resist an inappropriate joke. Neal looks nervous, though, around the edges of the lust, so Dave gives himself a mental shake and pulls himself together. "Okay, sorry. Shoot."

Neal takes a deep breath. "I'm sorry," he says. "I shouldn't have told you like that, this summer. I should have… I don't know. Talked to you first. Something. I panicked, and it was a chickenshit way to go about it, so I'm sorry."

"Okay," Dave says, nodding. He lets his thumb rub back and forth across Neal's chest. "It's okay, but thanks for saying it. What's the second thing?"

"I'm…" Neal hesitates. "I needed to see you, but. I'm not here to try to join up again. I mean, I'd love to crash a few dates sometime, if you're cool with it, but…."

"You're committed," Dave says. He's surprised at how easy it is to say; there's an ache, still, but it's distant, anchored by calm. "It's important to you. I get that, man, honestly. Besides, I already have a lead guitarist." Suddenly it occurs to him that _he_ might know that, but he's not sure that _Devin_ knows that, what with Neal showing up out of the blue, and he winces and knocks his head back against the door. "Shit. I… I know this sounds nuts, but I have to—"

"Tell Devin?" Neal finishes for him, and Dave narrows his eyes.

"Did you get some psychic powers with the Rockstar Energy gig?"

Neal snorts. "No, I just know how I'd be feeling in his place. Go on, you should tell him."

Dave digs his phone out of his pocket with some effort—he's not wearing the most erection-friendly jeans in the world—and texts Devin, _Not that I hope I need to say this, but nothing's changed. You're my lead guitarist as long as you want to be_.

He's not sure whether he should wait for a response; while he's trying to figure it out, Neal leans in again to start nuzzling behind Dave's ear, scraping his teeth along Dave's jaw. Dave's vision goes hazy, and he's just about to give it up as a lost cause—he's not sure he could read at the moment anyway—when his phone buzzes in his hand.

 _I hope this isn't your idea of a threesome_ , says Devin's text, and then, a few seconds later, _Seriously, thanks man. Now get some or I quit._

"All good?" Neal asks, a low hum against the skin of Dave's throat.

Dave tosses his phone sideways without looking and hears it bounce (gently, he hopes) on the carpet. "Yep."

"Good," Neal says, and sinks to his knees.

Dave goes from hard to aching so fast that he's lightheaded with it. "Oh, Jesus." He watches tattooed letters wink in and out of sight as Neal's fingers play on the button of his jeans, on his zipper, and then, a few seconds later, on his cock. "Fuck. _Neal_."

"You've been kicking ass on this tour, by the way," Neal says conversationally, and follows it up with a long swipe of his tongue up the underside of Dave's dick. Dave's eyes cross, the rush of warmth at Neal's praise tangled with the rush of lust. He simultaneously wants to keep Neal talking forever and shut him up with his cock; it's a sweet struggle, which is probably exactly Neal's intention. "Switching up the covers," Neal goes on, examining Dave's dick like he can't quite decide what to do first, "going unplugged, even telling the crowd to be quiet for 'Lie.' I told you that would work—you just need to ask for what you want." He looks up through pale eyelashes, his mouth a wicked curve. "What do you want, Dave?"

"Your mouth," Dave says immediately—he's long past pride with Neal, like this. "Please, Neal, suck me, please, please—"

"Well, since you asked," Neal says, and takes him down deep.

Dave's fingers scrabble uselessly at the door behind him as his knees buckle; he manages to flail one hand out and brace himself on the doorknob while Neal pulls back and then goes right down again, all the way, no teasing now. It's been approximately a thousand years since Dave's dick has had any attention from anyone besides himself, and between that and the fact that Neal knows all his buttons, knows how to take Dave apart with every twist of his hand and flick of his tongue, it's not long before Dave is right on the edge, breathless and blurry.

His eyes have closed in self-defense against the tidal wave of sensation, but he forces them open again, wanting evidence that this is actually happening, that it's not just another dream that's going to leave him hard and alone in his bunk. But no, Neal's right there with him, chipped black nail polish on his fingers and red-gold showing at the roots of his hair, wearing a plaid shirt that Dave's never seen before, even though approximately one third of Neal's wardrobe consists of plaid shirts. The small details work better than a pinch on the arm, and it hits him, _this is Neal, this is happening_ , and Dave twists his fingers in the fabric at Neal's shoulder and comes, helplessly, down his throat.

After he's swallowed, Neal climbs back up Dave's body and kisses him hard, forcing Dave's own taste into his mouth, making aftershocks shudder through him.

"Gonna fuck you," Neal murmurs, leaving barely enough room between them for the words, "gonna fuck you so hard, Dave, you won't be able to sit down for a week—"

"Yeah," Dave groans, "yeah, yeah, do it," and shoves Neal backward, toward the bed.

They shed clothes on the way, clumsily; Dave gets one sock stuck on his foot and Neal gets caught in his own shirt and Dave thinks, with a giddy, sex-addled kind of glee, that Kira would probably be very disappointed in them both. They manage eventually, though, and Dave stops long enough to grab a condom out of his bag, then turns around to find Neal digging a bottle of lube out of his discarded jeans.

Dave raises an eyebrow at him. "So you were that sure you were gonna get laid, huh?"

"I have met you, you know," Neal answers, grinning. "Also, you were sending me love notes through YouTube for a week, I figured that was pretty much a green light."

"I wasn't sending you love notes through YouTube," Dave says with mock offense, "I was sending you love notes through _notes_. Your notes, specifically. Also through your words, but—"

"Message received," Neal interrupts, and he's smiling fondly, but his eyes are dark with want. "Now get on the damn bed."

Anticipation skittering down his spine, Dave does what he's told. He sweeps the comforter out of the way—he's seen CSI, he doesn't want to add to any DNA that might be clinging to it—and then settles himself on his hands and knees, waiting.

Neal's weight dips the mattress behind him. And it's not like Dave isn't expecting to be touched, but when Neal's lips press between his shoulderblades, it sends a jolt through him anyway. He knows exactly where his gun and rose tattoo is, even when he can't see it; sometimes it feels like it's engraved on the back of his heart. Neal leaves his mouth there for a long moment, then pulls back and pats the side of Dave's hip.

"Over," he says. "I want to see you."

"Oh," Dave says, and it's stupid, but he's absurdly touched. Not to mention totally in favor of the idea, because fuck _yes_ , he wants to see Neal's face, too, watch him come apart. "Okay, yeah." He rolls over onto his back and lets Neal settle himself between Dave's splayed knees. While Neal's distracted reaching back for the lube, Dave sits up and starts running his hands over Neal's bare chest, his shoulders, back down to his stomach, inspecting the skin carefully.

"What are you doing?" Neal asks, voice gone husky.

"Looking for new ink," Dave answers. "Don't tell me you don't have any."

Neal makes a wordless noise, part pleasure and part amusement. "'M running out of room."

"Yeah, well, I read about this new cloning technology they're working on; maybe they can grow you a second torso," Dave suggests.

"Kinky. Have to design a guitar to go with it, then," Neal points out.

Dave snickers. "Obviously." He gets to the rock-flag-eagle tattoo and stops, remembering: early on in the Declaration Tour, and the crowd had been electric, eating out of the palms of their hands; close to home and settling into a groove, the whole band had been on fire, and the feeling had been palpable, _we own this, we can do this_. They'd stumbled outside riding the post-show high and Neal had hooked an arm around Dave's neck and smacked a kiss to the side of his head, and Dave had felt like even his bones were curving with the strain of wanting to be near Neal—wanting _him_ , though Dave hadn't been ready to see it at the time. He'd covered by blurting out, "Tattoos, let's get tattoos," and Neal had laughed up at the Midwest stars and said, "Fuck yes."

"I'm sorry," Dave says now, looking up at Neal. "For all the time I wasted being pissed off at you. I should know better than that."

Neal smiles, the soft, gentle smile that always feels like a gift. "Hey. Nothing here is wasted," he says.

Dave laughs a little. But he thinks it over, too, thinks of the months behind him: the victories, the regrets, the hard-learned lessons. He reflects Neal's smile back at him. "Fair enough," he agrees. He may be sorry about things he did or didn't do, but he's not sorry to have had the experience; some lessons, he figures, you don't learn until you're forced to.

Of course, he's also incredibly glad to have Neal naked and right in front of him, and it's starting to feel like way past time he did something about that, so he lets his other hand drift down toward Neal's crotch. "You're being really patient for a guy who hasn’t come yet," he murmurs.

"Hnnh," Neal manages, eyes heavy-lidded. "Well, I've been growing as a person, too."

Dave can't resist. "I can see that," he says in his best porn-star voice, taking Neal's cock in his hand.

They both dissolve into snickering; Neal says, "Fuck, I don't know why I let you—" then breaks off as Dave strokes him once, rough, just like he likes it. _"Fuck."_

 _Some things never change_ , Dave thinks smugly. "You were saying?"

But Neal doesn’t answer in words, just kisses him hard, fucking up into Dave's fist. A few more strokes, and Neal's teeth close briefly on Dave's bottom lip before he shifts his weight and sends Dave sprawling back onto the bed.

"Did I say a week?" Neal rakes down Dave's body with his eyes; the snap of the lube bottle opening sets Dave's mouth watering, the perfect Pavlovian response. "I meant a month."

Dave swallows hard and gives him a cocky grin. "Bring it."

Almost before the words are out of his mouth, Neal is sinking one finger inside him, blunt and cool; Dave arches his neck, mouth falling open. It's been too long, too fucking long—

"Yeah," Neal says, sounding fascinated. "God, your face, Dave. I haven't even started yet." He takes his time, sliding in and out, slow and deliberate and devastating, until Dave is hitching his hips and trying not to go insane from the not-quite-enough of it; just when he's about to start begging, though, Neal adds a second finger, and Dave bows up off the bed.

"Ah—" he gasps. It's good, it's so good, Neal opening him up like this, the slight buzz of calluses under the slick slide of the lube. His own cock is getting hard again, swelling against his stomach.

"Look at that," Neal murmurs. "You love it, don't you? Love my fingers in you."

"Yes," Dave babbles eagerly, "yes, yes," and it's been a while and they should probably go to three, but he can't wait. "Want your cock, Neal, it's good, I'm good, just do it, fuck me, come on."

He can see how much Neal wants it, how much it turns him on that Dave wants it; his eyelids flutter shut and a muscle jumps in his jaw, but he takes a deep breath and looks at Dave carefully. "Are you sure?"

"Tiemann," Dave grits out. "Put your goddamn cock in me or—" _you're fired_ , he almost says, then redirects at the last second, "no phone sex for you."

"Like that wouldn't hurt you as much as it would hurt me," Neal says. But with one last twist, he slips his fingers out; Dave tears the condom open with his teeth and throws the packet at Neal. "Romantic," Neal observes as it bounces off his chest.

"Y'know, I was hearing a lot of big talk earlier, 'won't be able to sit down for a month, blah blah blah,' but so far…." Dave's mouth is basically running on autopilot at this point; most of his attention is taken up by the sight of Neal sliding the condom down over the flushed, hard length of his dick, then pouring more lube over his fingers, slicking himself up. Dave writhes on the bed.

Neal pushes Dave's knees toward his shoulders, spreading him out. "So fucking impatient."

"Well, if you'd actually _fuck_ me, I wouldn't have to be—ungh." Dave's voice trails off into a grunt of pleasure as Neal finally, fucking _finally_ starts to press inside him. Slow, at first, letting Dave get used to the stretch and burn, and yeah, three fingers probably would have been a good idea, but Dave loves it just like this, feeling every millimeter.

"Fuck," Neal gasps, "so tight—" After what feels like an eternity, he finally bottoms out, and then stops moving, braced on his arms, looking down at Dave. Dave feels utterly exposed—he can't hide things from Neal under the best of circumstances, and definitely not when he's naked, with Neal's cock in his ass—and it's a relief, actually, after all this time spent hiding, pretending not to care. He sucks at indifference. Neal dips down to kiss him, all teeth and tongue.

"Missed you," he says roughly, then pulls out all the way and thrusts back in with enough force to move Dave up a couple of inches on the bed.

It drives a keening noise out of Dave's mouth; his head falls to the side. "Missed you too, _shit_ , do that again…."

So he does, and again, and again, until he finds just the right angle to make fireworks go off behind Dave's eyelids. And once he finds it, he stays with it, the drive of his hips relentless, breath coming quick and harsh while Dave thrusts up to meet him as best he can.

"So good, you're so good for me, Dave, the way you take it, you feel so good, make me so hard, couldn't stop thinking about this, all the way here, _fuck_ , missed you…."

In calmer times, it always cracks Dave up that of the two of them, Neal is actually the talker during sex; of course, it's anything but funny when he's in it, hearing the rasp of Neal's voice in his ears, the words spilling out of him like he couldn't stop them if he tried. With an incoherent noise, Dave reaches down to touch his own dick, there where it's leaking against his stomach, but Neal catches his wrist and slams it down above his head.

"No," he says fiercely. "Want you to come on my cock, just like this. Can you do that? Will you do that for me?"

"Yes," Dave answers, and he doesn't have any idea whether it's true or not, but he doesn't care, doesn't want to refuse Neal anything when he looks so open, so desperate. He can feel the pressure building with every thrust, a tight coil of pleasure at the base of his spine; the solid bulk of Neal's body above him is a grounding force, sweat-slick and ink-swirled, familiar and new again. He strains against Neal's hold on his wrist, just to feel the resistance, and Neal grips harder, leans down to press his mouth to Dave's.

"Love you," Neal breathes into the space between them, pistoning his hips, holding to his rhythm with the same unshakeable instinct that Dave's relied on a hundred times onstage, "love you, c'mon, come for me, David, want to see you, c'mon, give it up for me, love you so fucking much," and Dave does, spilling hot against his own stomach and Neal's chest. Before Dave's vision has even cleared, Neal buries himself deep and comes hard enough that Dave can feel every pulse, all with Neal still murmuring unintelligibly into his skin.

They stay like that for a while afterward, Neal collapsed on top of Dave, warm and solid and breathing hard, ruffling the sweaty hair at the back of Dave's neck with each breath. He's going to get too heavy in a minute, but Dave's not going to move until he absolutely has to—each ounce of weight, each inch of sticky skin, is proof that Neal is here, and Dave wants to savor that as long as possible. He takes advantage of Neal's slackened grip to slip his wrist out from under Neal's hand and tangle their fingers together instead; Neal squeezes once, hard, and holds on.

In Dave's experience, Neal is usually good for about five minutes of post-sex cuddling before his neat-freak tendencies get the better of him; apparently that hasn't changed much, either, though it might be a little longer than usual before Neal makes a muffled "mmph" noise and shifts on top of him. He reaches down between them, grips the bottom of the condom carefully as he pulls out. Dave holds back a wince; yeah, he's gonna be feeling that tomorrow. The thought sends a lazy curl of warmth through his stomach.

"Don't go anywhere," Neal says, settling back on his heels.

Dave smiles up at him. "I'll clear my schedule."

Neal laughs, then rolls off the bed and pads unsteadily to the bathroom, coming back a few minutes later with his hair loose around his shoulders and a warm washcloth in his hands. Dave's expecting Neal to just drop the washcloth on him, but instead, he takes his time cleaning Dave up, the texture of the cloth a pleasant friction on Dave's over-sensitized skin.

"You and Pauling sound awesome together," Dave says suddenly.

The motion of the washcloth stops. Neal looks at Dave through the bleached-blond curtain of his hair, the ghost of a smile hovering around his snakebites. "Yeah?"

"Hell yeah," Dave answers, because he means it and it's long past time he said it, and because he wants to watch that smile burst to life across Neal's face—he's missed the hell out of that, too. "It's badass, dude, nobody does the co-lead thing anymore."

"It's so fucking fun," Neal admits, unguarded enthusiasm beaming from behind his eyes like he's just been waiting to unleash it. "That guy can _rip_. And you get five times the complexity just by adding that one extra instrument. It's crazy, because—" His fingers twitch, clearly on the verge of air guitar; he tosses the washcloth toward the bathroom without looking and climbs under the bedsheet, still talking. Dave climbs in with him happily, pulling the comforter up around them both.

It's been a hell of a long day, a hell of a long _tour_ , and Dave normally doesn't make it long between orgasm and sleep. But now that the floodgates are open and the clock is ticking, there's so much he wants to talk to Neal about—setlists, truck stop graffiti, Andy and Jennie's engagement, the bridge on 'Heaven or Worse,' the last episode of _It's Always Sunny_ , the fragility of the Hell or Highwater RV—that he fights it as long as he can, while the insides of his eyelids get sandy and Neal's voice gets rough with overuse. Dave won't look at the clock on the nightstand, so he has no idea what time it is when he finally falls asleep, but he can hear Neal breathing next to him, and it's enough.

 

*****

 

The morning dawns clear, bright, and way too fucking early; Dave wakes up at 8:30 and can't go back to sleep, not once he sees Neal lying there with the sheet twisted around his waist, pale skin marked by Dave's mouth, his fingers. They've got a few hours left before Neal has to be at the airport, so Dave texts the band to meet them for breakfast at the hotel restaurant in forty-five minutes, then wakes Neal up with a slow, thorough blowjob. Of course, Neal ambushes him in the shower afterwards and they're late anyway, which leads to no end of shit from the band once they finally do make it downstairs. Dave just grins a supremely satisfied I-just-got-totally-laid grin and lets it all flow past him.

For once, he doesn't feel compelled to say much during breakfast, either, content to enjoy the continuous pinball game of bullshit and old jokes that bounces between Neal and the rest of the band, feeling the warmth of Neal's thigh pressed against his under the table. He gets a particular kick out of watching Neal and Devin, who bond even more over pancakes than they did over bourbon—there's a lot of vehement agreement and several high-fives and when breakfast is over, Dave half-expects them to trade home addresses like kids leaving summer camp.

In the light of day, Neal looks happy, too, relaxed in a way that Dave had almost forgotten was possible. He laughs easier and longer, and he might relish a fight, but there are battles and there are battles, and clearly the ones he's fighting now are the kind that fire him up instead of wearing him down. _He wouldn't have stuck it out so long for anyone but you_ , Dave remembers Kira saying. He can hear that now for what it is; he presses his knee a little closer to Neal's under the table.

Neal looks over at him and smiles.

"Hey, some of us are trying to eat, here," Andy objects, with a grin that completely obliterates his chances of fooling anyone.

Eventually, though, the alarm on Neal's phone goes off. "Last call," he says ruefully, and pushes his chair back from the table.

The goodbyes are a lot less fun to watch than the conversation had been; Neal hugs everyone hard, and Andy last and longest of all. Then there's nothing left for him to do but head outside to wait for his cab, and Dave goes with him.

"Back to the road," Neal says as they come out the hotel's front doors, blinking into the winter sun.

"Yep. And I'm back to corporate servitude," Dave says, but he can say it lightly now, teasing. After all these months, he's at peace with the path he's on.

Neal shades his eyes and looks over. "You know, it takes guts to do what you're doing, too, being willing to wade through all the bullshit to get to what's important to you."

Dave laughs, disbelieving. "Doc, I already slept with you, you don't have to sweet-talk me now."

Neal's gaze doesn't waver. "I mean it," he says. "You're in the belly of the beast, man; someone there should have some fucking integrity."

And of course Neal's good opinion is important to Dave, it always has been. But he hadn't realized how much it bothered him, the secret fear that Neal might think he's a sellout, up until he found out it wasn't true. "Thanks, dude," he says, after he's let it sink in for a minute. "I… thanks." He can't dwell on it or he's going to start sniffling out here in front of God and the bellhops and everyone, so he clears his throat and slants a grin at Neal. "You change the system from the outside, I change it from the inside, huh?"

Neal grins back. "Yeah. You can be Wyatt Earp, I'll be Doc Holliday."

"I'm your huckleberry. With a happier ending," Dave adds firmly, and Neal laughs.

"Fuck yes," he agrees. "With a happier ending." He hesitates, then goes on, the words tripping over themselves a little: "And for the record, when I was playing with you guys, I did it because I loved it. Even when I hated all the other bullshit, I always loved that."

God _dammit_ , Dave is not going to cry in front of a fucking Holiday Inn. He hauls Neal into a hug instead, holds on tight until he can see the cab pulling up into the carriageway. "Take care of yourself," he mumbles into Neal's neck.

"You too."

"And fucking call me this time, asshole," Dave adds, stepping back and thumping Neal on the shoulder.

Neal laughs again, and Dave can't tell if his eyes are shiny or if it's just a trick of the light, but there's no mistaking the intent in his voice. "I owe you one," he says, low and rich with promise.

Dave grins; he's not exactly sure how this is all going to work, sharing Neal with Kira _and_ with Hell or Highwater, but at least he doesn't really anticipate any more phone-sex blue balls in the future. "Damn right."

The cab is waiting. Neal grabs Dave for one last hug, hard enough to squeeze the breath out of his lungs. "Love you," Neal murmurs in his ear, and sneaks a kiss behind it, hidden in Dave's hair.

"You too," Dave tells him fiercely. Then Neal's pulling back, sliding into the cab; Dave waves as it drives away, sees what he assumes is Neal waving back, a blur through the tinted windows.

After the cab is out of sight, Dave shoves his hands in his pockets and squints up into the pale blue sky. Europe soon. _Europe._ He can't fucking wait.

"Forward on," he says out loud, smiling, and heads back inside.


End file.
